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ALGERNON 

CHARLESl 
SWINBURN 


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Pepsonal  Recollections 

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Mrs.  Disney  Leitn' 


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ALGERNON  CHARLES 
SWINBURNE 


PERSONAL  RECOLLECTIONS 
BY  HIS  COUSIN 

MRS.     DISNEY     LEITH 


WITH  EXTRACTS  FROM  SOME 
OF  HIS  PRIVATE   LETTERS 


ILLUSTRATED 


G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 

NEW  YORK  AND    LONDON 

XLbc  Tknicfterbocftcr  press 
1917 


COPyRlGHT,    I917 

By 
G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 


Ube  ftnfclierbocliet  pvcee,  -new  ISocIt 


n9 

^ 

I 


5513 


IN   DEAR   MEMORY  OP 

HER 

W^O  LEFT  ME  THIS  WORK  TO  DO 

I   DEDICATE 

WHATEVER  IN  IT  IS  WORTHY 


s3 

^  PREFATORY  NOTE 

'*^''      The    following    "Recollections"     (with    the 
verses  "  A  Year's  Mind  ")  appeared  originally 
in    the  April    number  of    the    Contemporary 
Review    in    1910.     They    have    been    revised 
and  considerably  expanded  since  they  first 
appeared,    and    in    their    amended 
condition   are  now  at  length 
given  to  the  world. 


i 


A  YEAR'S  MIND 

April,  that  "made  "  and  took  him,  comes  once  more 

To  that  fair  Undercliflf  he  loved  so  well 
And  truly,  cliff  and  crag  and  rock-strewn  shore, 

And  to  the  garden-graves  of  one  sweet  dell 
Where,  deaf  to  love  that  clung  and  prayed  and  wept, 
(While  this  fair  world  its  Easter  sabbath  kept) 
Twelve  moons  ago,  he  laid  him  down  and  slept. 

Around  in  grassy  nook  and  tangled  brake 

Primrose  and  violet  begin  to  peer, 
And  celandine's  wide  star-bright  eyes  awake; 

And  all  the  woods  are  vocal — far  and  near 
The  air  is  filled  with  Life's  reviving  hum; 
The  time  of  many  singing-birds  is  come; 
Only  our  Singer's  lips  and  lyre  are  dumb. 

The  fame  he  craved  not,  courted  not,  abides. 
The  songs  he  sang  shall  hardly  pass  away 
While  Culver's  stark  white  steep  withstands  the  tides, 
'  Or  Httle  children  in  the  Landslip  play 

As  once  he  played  there :  eve  and  crystal  dawn 
Seem  goodlier  now  on  shore  and  sea  and  lawn 
That  hence  such  music  and  such  might  were  drawn. 

But  fairer  than  the  light  on  field  and  foam, 

And  brighter  than  his  fame  which  fills  the  land, 
His  love  of  kindred  and  his  love  of  home 

And  all  things  crue  and  beautiful,  shall  stand 
Immortal;  and  the  mists  of  pain  and  gloom 
Approach  not,  nor  shall  mar  the  fadeless  bloom 
Of  Love  that  hallows  and  that  guards  his  tomb. 

M.C.J.L. 
April  JO,  igoQ. 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGB 

A.  C.  Swinburne,  ^tat  25        .         .     Frontispiece 

East  Dene,  Bonchurch.  ....         6 

Rear-Admiral  C.  H.  Swinburne        ...       14 

The  Lady  Jane  Swinburne       ....       38 

Miss  Alice  Swinburne     .....       86 

Swinburne's    Handwriting    and    Autograph, 

i860 156 

Miss  Isabel  Swinburne   .         .         .         .         .214 

Swinburne's    Handwriting    and    Autograph, 

1907 228 


Algernon  Charles  Swinburne 


Algernon  Charles  Swinburne 


I  HAVE  undertaken  to  give  some  notes  of  my 
early  recollections  of  my  cousin,  Algernon 
Charles  Swinburne. 

When  one's  recollections  go  back  to  sitting 
on  the  nursery  floor  together  playing  with  bricks, 
it  is  rather  difficult  to  know  exactly  where  one 
ought  to  start  for  biographical  purposes.  Per- 
haps I  had  better  begin  by  saying  just  what  our 
relationship  was,  as  it  is  of  a  rather  compli- 
cated nature.  Our  mothers  (daughters  of  the 
third  Earl  of  Ashbumham)  were  sisters;  our 
fathers,  first  cousins — more  alike  in  characters 
and  tastes,  more  linked  in  closest  friendship, 
than  many  brothers.  Added  to  this,  our  pa- 
ternal grandmothers — two  sisters  and  co- 
heiresses— were  first  cousins  to  our  common 
maternal  grandmother;  thus  our  fathers  were 
also  second  cousins  to  their  wives  before  mar- 
riage. Whether  this  complexity  of  relation- 
ship had  anything  to  do  with  the  strong  sisterly 

3 


4    ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

tie  always  existing  between  my  Swinburne 
cousins  and  myself  I  cannot  say;  but  I  here 
give  it  for  what  it  is  worth,  adding  that  from 
my  earliest  recollections  "Cousin  Hadji"  (the 
childish  name  which  clung  to  him  through  life 
is  so  widely  known  that  there  is  no  harm  in  my 
using  it)  was  to  me  as  an  elder  brother,  a  loved 
and  sympathetic  playmate,  as  in  later  years  a 
loyal  and  affectionate  friend. ' 

One  observation  I  should  like  to  make  at  the 
start.  I  know  it  is  difficult  for  the  world  to 
understand  such  friendships  as  ours  without 
weaving  into  them  a  thread  of  romance,  exist- 
ing only  in  its  imagination.  I  know  that  such 
has  been  the  case  even  with  us,  and  that  a  fic- 
tion has  somehow  been  built  up,  and  has  even 
got  into  print.  Therefore,  especially,  I  am 
anxious  to  say  once  and  for  all  that  there  was 

'  There  was  a  false  impression  regarding  the  ejdstence  of  a  French 
ancestress  in  the  Swinburne  family  which  Algernon  himself  shared, 
and  he  seems  to  have  been  unable  to  divest  himself  of  the  idea. 
Its  explanation  and  refutation  have  been  left  in  writing  by  his 
youngest  sister,  and  I  may  as  well  give  their  substance.  The  father 
of  their  great-grandmother  (her  name  was  Christiana  Dillon), 
having  married  en  secondes  noces  a  Miss  Dicconson  who  was  brought 
up  in  France,  lived  there  almost  entirely,  and  his  children  by  his 
second  wife  were  brought  up  there  by  their  mother  after  his  death. 
Miss  Swinburne  thinks  that  Algernon  may  have  heard  his  Swin- 
burne grandfather  talk  of  his  French  kinsfolk,  but  there  was  no 
blood  relationship — as  doubtless  Algernon,  with  his  strong  French 
proclivities  and  sympathies,  would  fain  have  believed. 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE  5 

never,  in  all  our  years  of  friendship,  an  oimce  of 
sentiment  between  us.  Any  idea  of  the  kind 
would  have  been  an  insult  to  our  brother-and- 
sister  footing,  and  would  have  destroyed  at 
once  and  for  ever  otir  unfettered  intercourse 
and  happy  intimacy,  which  Algernon  himself 
has  so  beautifully  described  in  the  "Dedication" 
to  me  of  his  tragedy  of  Rosamund,  Queen  of  the 
Lombards: 

"Scarce  less  in  love  than  brother  and  sister  born, 
Even  all  save  brother  and  sister  sealed  at  birth." 

My  first  connected  recollection  of  the  nursery 
days  to  which  I  have  alluded  was  seeing  Alger- 
non riding  on  a  very  small  Shetland  pony,  which 
he  named  "York,"  led  by  a  servant.  As  our 
respective  families  lived  in  the  same  small 
island — at  times  only  five  miles  apart,  when  I 
was  at  my  grandparents'  house — The  Orchard — 
at  Niton,  the  interchange  of  visits  was  frequent, 
and  we  intermingled  as  one  large  family.  To 
me,  who  had  no  brother  or  sister  actually  of  my 
own,  it  was  great  joy  to  be  launched  into  a  group 
of  more  or  less  contemporary  children.  I  can 
distinctly  remember  often,  in  those  very  early 
days,  seeing  Algernon  and  his  eldest  sister  walk- 
ing on  ahead  of  the  rest  over  the  rough  grass 


6    ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

of  the  Bonchurch  Down — he  with  that  springy, 
dancing  step  which  he  never  entirely  lost ;  while 
I,  a  much  younger  and  very  unsteady -footed 
child,  stumbled  along  after  them  among  the 
younger  fry,  with  frequent  falls,  and  a  feeling 
of  pursuing  the  imattainable.  In  the  recol- 
lection of  those  walks  and  games  "up  the  hill," 
it  seems  strange  that  I  should  have  been  the 
only  one  of  that  band  of  playmates  to  follow  and 
walk  at  his  dear  and  honoured  head  on  his  last 
journey  up  that  steep  Bonchurch  shute  to  his 
resting-place  in  the  churchyard. 

When  we  were  at  East  Dene  on  Sundays  the 
children  all  said  their  Catechism  together;  and 
my  aimt — whose  teaching  was  exactly  the  same 
as  my  mother's — would  let  me  join  her  little 
class.  I  can  remember  even  then  how  beautiful 
Algernon's  reading  was  when  it  was  his  turn  to 
read  or  repeat  a  passage  or  text. 

Nursery  days  glided  on  into  schoolroom  days 
without  much  definite  demarcation.  I  did  not 
as  a  rule  join  in  my  cousins'  lessons  though  I 
was  often  in  the  schoolroom  while  lessons  were 
going  on ;  and,  of  course,  at  play  and  meal-times. 
I  do  not  remember  anything  of  special  note, 
except  the  fact  that  Algernon  was  always  privi- 
leged to  have  a    book    at    meal-times.     I    do 


h 


'tr- 


,'  j',  '»E,ai  ill  S^iV.  >( 


'i'?^ 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE         7 

not  know  when  the  habit  began.  But  there 
was  always  the  book,  at  tea-time  especially; 
it  was  a  fat  Shakespeare,  as  far  as  I  remember. ' 
One  little  schoolroom  incident  I  do  recall;  a 
trifle,  but  characteristic.  On  some  afternoons 
the  children's  amusement  was  painting;  we  used 
to  have  little  scraps  cut  from  illustrated  papers, 
to  paint  in  water-colour.  The  governess  would 
read  aloud  to  us  little  stories  of  the  "Penny 
Reward  Book  "  series,  which  were  issued  in  those 
days  for  children.  There  was  a  discussion  one 
day  as  to  which  story  should  be  read,  one  being 
doubtful,  because  the  governess  said  there  was 
something  we  would  not  like,  about  drowning 
puppies.  "Oh,"  said  Algernon,  vehemently, 
"if  it's  anything  about  cruelty  to  animals, 
don't  read  it!"  speaking  exactly  in  the  tone  he 
used  in  later  years  about  any  book  he  disliked. 
He  was  devoted  to  and  tender-hearted  about 
animals;  horses  and  cats,  perhaps  (witness  his 
splendid  short  poem  To  a  Cat) ,  were  the  favour- 
ites.    Of  his  fearless  riding  I  may  speak  later. 

When  he  was  going  as  a  pupil  to  Brooke 
Rectory  (I.  W.)  to  be  prepared  for  Eton  he  spent 
a  few  days  with  my  parents,  our  home — North- 

'  Lord  Redesdale,  in  his  Memories,  alludes  to  this  favourite  book 
being  taken  by  Algernon  to  school. 


8    ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

court — ^being  nearer  to  Brooke  than  his.  We 
had  a  great  time  together,  and  used  to  run  up 
and  down  a  long  passage,  nominally  "playing 
at  horses,"  but  usually,  if  I  remember,  acting 
"people"  as  well.  We  were  all  fond  of  this 
pastime,  and  his  "people"  were  often  of  a  very 
comic  description.  When  he  was  at  Brooke 
my  mother  and  I  went  to  see  him  after  he  was 
established  there.  He  carried  me  off  up  to  his 
own  room,  which  he  exhibited  with  great  glee, 
saying:  ''Everything  in  this  room  is  mine."  I 
immediately  pointed  to  a  very  large  family 
portrait  of  a  lady  and  child,  saying:  "Is  that 
yoiu-s  ?  "     "  No — but  everything  else  is. " 

The  first  serial  stories  of  Charles  Dickens 
were  coming  out  during  his  schooldays;  and  he 
was  the  only  one  of  the  younger  generation 
privileged  to  read  them — of  course,  they  were 
beyond  the  rest  of  us.  But  we  heard  a  good 
deal  about  them  from  him,  and  we  used  to  be 
shown  "Phiz's"  wonderful  illustrations  as  they 
came  out.  Algernon's  admiration  for  the  stories, 
begun  at  this  time,  continued  through  life. 

I  remember  one  occasion  on  which  he  made  us 
all  into  a  kind  of  tableau  out  of  Dombey  and  Son 
—himself  taking  the  part  of  Mrs.  Skewton  in 
her  Bath  chair!     There  was  a  consultation  as 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE  9 

to  who  should  be  Carker — whoever  could  show 
the  best  set  of  teeth.  I  was  eager  to  qualify 
for  a  part,  and  put  on  a  tremendous  grin,  which 
I  was  told  would  do!  Apropos  of  his  love  of 
Dickens,  he  says  in  a  letter  to  me  so  late  as 
1901:  "I  am  writing  a  short  essay  on  Dickens 
to  be  prefixed  to  a  new  edition  of  Oliver  Twist; 

W is  writing  (or  about  to  write)  a  similar 

introduction  to  A  Tale  of  Two  Cities,  I  thought 
you  might  like  to  hear  of  this  undertaking,  tho' 
I  fancy — and  fear —  D.  was  never  such  a  house- 
hold god  with  you  and  yours  at  Northcourt  as 
with  me  and  mine  at  East  Dene  in  our  early 
days.  Never  shall  I  forget  the  monthly  ap- 
pearance of  the  first  of  his  books  I  was  old 
enough  to  take  in — Bleak  House,  which  ran 
through  two  of  my  years  at  Eton  and  was  apt 
to  interfere  with  my  work  rather  seriously  on 
the  first  of  each  month.  Don't  I  remember  how 
I  used  to  scuttle  up  to  town  to  Ingalton's  after 
morning  school,  to  get  it  before  school  and 
prayer-time." 

With  all  his  early  love  of  books  and  verse,  be 
it  remembered,  he  never  posed  as  a  child-poet. 
A  great  sense  of  rhythm  and  facility  for  verse 
of  a  sort  he  certainly  must  always  have  possessed, 
but  anything  of  the  kind  was  invariably  comic, 


10   ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

and  generally  spouted  on  the  impulse  of  the 
moment.  He  used  before  and  during  his  school- 
days to  write  dramas  of  a  bloodcurdling  and 
highly  tragic  nature,  in  which  a  frequent  stage 
direction — "stabs  the  king" — passed  into  a 
family  joke.  I  mention  this  as  a  false  idea 
appears  to  have  somehow  got  abroad  that  there 
were  early  efforts  of  his  which  attracted  atten- 
tion. The  figment  which — through  an  acciden- 
tal coincidence  of  initial — got  into  print  as  to 
certain  verses  in  Eraser's  Magazine,  is  hardly 
worth  recalling  except  to  show  how  much  may 
be  built  up  on  a  false  foundation.  And  even 
had  it  been  the  case  that  he  had  attempted 
serious  verse  at  an  early  age,  his  parents  were 
the  last  persons  in  the  world  to  seek  publicity 
for  such  efforts.  Children  in  those  days  did 
not  rush  into  print  with  the  facility  which 
juvenile  magazines  and  "children's  salons''  offer 
in  these  later  times. 

We  were  both  staying  in  London  one  spring 
at  our  maternal  grandmother's  during  a  part 
of  the  Eton  holidays,  at  which  time  he  was 
taken  by  her  to  visit  the  poet  Samuel  Rogers, 
then  a  very  old  man.  Years  afterwards,  when 
we  were  reading  Tennyson's  Maud  together, 
he  told  me  how  he  had  read  it  first  at  that  time, 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        ii 

and  how  special  parts  had  impressed  him.  There 
is  a  reference  to  the  sun  as  a  "dull  red  ball," 
which  came  home  to  him  at  sight  of  a  London 
sun.  I  did  not  know  anything  about  Maud 
at  that  early  date,  but  I  recollect  the  "dull  red 
ball"  to  this  day. 

I  had  my  first  impressions  of  Macaulay's 
Lays  of  Ancient  Rome  from  him.  I  was  always 
fond  of  Roman  history  as  a  child.  And  the 
spirited,  sounding  periods  of  the  Lays  repeated 
to  me  by  Algernon — often  when  we  were  riding 
together — took  a  lively  hold  of  my  imagination. 
Very  great  was  my  pride  and  delight  when  he 
presented  me  with  a  copy  of  the  first  edition. 
I  have  the  dear  little  brown  book  now,  with  my 
name  written  and  the  date  1854. 

Some  of  our  happiest  days  together  were 
spent  at  his  grandfather's  (my  great -uncle)  Sir 
John  Swinbtime's  house  at  Capheaton.  The 
family  always  spent  the  late  stimmer  and  au- 
tumn with  him,  and  I  often  enjoyed  a  short  visit 
on  my  parents'  journey  south  from  our  Scotch 
home.  Sir  John  Swinburne,  who  lived  to  a 
patriarchal  age,  was  the  most  genial  of  men, 
and  loved  to  fill  his  house  with  grandchildren 
or  nieces.  A  large  counsinhood  gathered  there 
in  those  bright  autumn  days,  where  everything 


12        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

seemed  to  combine  for  the  delight  of  youth — 
a  lake  to  row  or  sail  on,  lovely  gardens  and 
woods  to  roam  or  play  in,  and,  above  all,  abund- 
ance of  ponies  to  ride.  In  these  delights  we 
revelled,  and  many  a  masterpiece  of  the  Victor- 
ian poets  was  recited — as  only  Algernon  could 
recite — during  a  spirited  canter  or  a  leisurely 
saunter  on  horseback  through  those  beautiful 
Northumbrian  roads  or  fields. 

I  have  not  said  anything  about  his  personal 
appearance.  There  have  been  varying  descrip- 
tions of  him  given  to  the  world — some  of  which 
can  be  characterized  only  as  grotesque.  Ros- 
setti's  early  portraits  give  perhaps  the  best  idea 
of  him  in  youth,  and  some  photographs  taken 
at  Pau;  but  of  all  portraits  in  later  life  the  palm 
must  be  given  to  a  large  full-face  photo  taken 
at  Putney,  which  is  as  speaking  a  likeness  as  I 
have  ever  seen  of  any  man.  Lord  Redesdale's 
description  of  him  when  he  went  to  Eton  first 
is  pleasing  and  characteristic.  He  speaks  of 
him  as  "strangely  tiny" — ^this  may  have  been 
the  case,  though  to  a  younger  child  it  would 
not  be  so  apparent.  We  were  not  a  tall  family, 
and  he  seemed  always  to  keep  his  proportionate 
place  in  our  midst. 

I  should  say  the  eyes  were  the  most  striking 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        13 

feature  in  his  face.  Always  expressive,  they 
had,  when  he  was  at  all  eager  or  excited,  a  pe- 
culiar brightness — as  if  his  soul  actually  leapt 
up  to  them  and  went  out  to  you.  I  can  describe 
it  no  otherwise.  A  peculiarity  was  the  length 
and  thickness  of  the  eyelashes,  which  he  used 
to  complain  would  get  entangled  in  a  high  wind. 

The  habit  of  drawing  down  and  shaking  his 
arms  and  hands  when  animated  began  in  very 
early  days — one  who  could  remember  said  it 
originated  in  his  watching  a  spinning  toy  when 
quite  an  infant.  Certainly  it  climg  to  him  for 
life  in  a  greater  or  less  degree.  He  was  wiry 
and  very  agile  in  figure  and  quite  in  proportion, 
though  the  height  of  his  splendid  forehead,  and 
in  youth  the  profusion  of  hair,  gave  his  head 
perhaps  the  appearance  of  being  large  for  his 
small  stature. 

It  is  here  that  I  should  allude  to  an  event — I 
cannot  call  it  a  reminiscence,  for  I  do  not  re- 
member hearing  of  it  at  the  time,  or,  indeed, 
for  long  after — that  has  a  curious  bearing  upon 
the  trend  of  Algernon's  mind  at  the  period. 
Years  after  he  described  it  to  me  by  letter,  and 
I  think  it  is  only  fair  to  give  it  as  far  as  possible 
in  his  own  words,  prefacing  that  Culver  Cliff — 
the  great  white  chalk  promontory  to  the  south- 


14        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

east  of  the  Isle  of  Wight — is  about  as  unassail- 
able to  ordinary  mortals  as  any  of  otn-  island 
ramparts. 

"If  you  really  want  to  know  about  my  doing 
Culver,  I  don't  mind  telling  you."  Then  he 
speaks  of  himself  for  a  few  sentences  jestingly 
and  in  the  third  person,  saying  that  my  never 
having  heard  of  the  occurrence  showed  that  he 
was  not  a  boy  to  brag  or  swagger. 

"But  he  didn't  care  to  talk  about  the  great 
disappointment  of  his  life.  After  leaving  Eton 
near  the  end  of  his  seventeenth  year  he  wanted 
to  go  into  the  army.  Didn't  he,  poor  chap! 
The  Balaklava  Charge  eclipsed  all  other  visions. 
To  be  prepared  for  such  a  chance  as  that,  in- 
stead of  being  prepared  for  Oxford,  was  the  one 
dream  of  his  life.  I  am  sure  you  won't  deride 
it  because  he  was  but  a  little,  slightly  built 
chap.  My  mother,"  he  continues,  "was  not 
altogether  against  it,  and  told  me  that  they 
must  take  three  days  to  think  the  matter  over. 
I  never  said  a  word  even  to  A."  (his  eldest  sister) 
"about  it,  but  at  the  end  of  the  three  days  they 
told  me  it  could  not  be;  my  father  had  made  up 
his  mind.  I  dare  say  now  he  was  quite  right. 
But  then  I  couldn't  and  didn't  say  anything. 
It  was  about  the  middle  of  the  Christmas  holi- 
days, and  I  went  out  for  a  good  hard  tramp  by 


REAR-ADMIRAL    C.    H.    SWINBURNE 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        15 

the  sea  till  I  found  myself  at  the  foot  of  Culver 
Cliff;  and  then  all  at  once  it  came  upon  me  that 
it  was  all  very  well  to  fancy  or  dream  of  'deadly 
danger'  and  forlorn  hopes  and  cavalry  charges, 
when  I  had  never  run  any  greater  risk  than  a 
football  'rooge';  but  that  here  was  a  chance  of 
testing  my  nerve  in  face  of  death  which  could 
not  be  surpassed.  So  I  climbed  a  rock  under 
the  highest  point,  and  stripped,  and  climbed 
down  again,  and  just  took  a  souse  into  the  sea 
to  steady  and  strengthen  my  nerve,  which  I 
knew  the  sharp  chill  would,  and  climbed  up 
again,  thinking  how  easy  it  would  be  to  climb 
the  whole  face  of  the  cliff  naked — or  at  least 
how  much  more  sure  one  would  feel  of  being 
able  to  do  it — if  one  did  not  mind  mere  scratches 
or  bruises;  but  to  that  prehistoric  sort  of  pro- 
ceeding there  were  obviously  other  objections 
than  the  atmosphere  of  midwinter.  So  I  dressed 
and  went  straight  at  it.  It  wasn't  so  hard  as 
it  looked,  most  of  the  way,  for  a  light  weight 
with  a  sure  foot  and  a  good  steady  head;  but 
as  I  got  near  the  top  I  remember  thinking  I 
should  not  like  to  have  to  climb  down  again. 
In  a  minute  or  two  more  I  found  that  I  must,  as 
the  top  part  (or  top  story)  of  the  precipice  came 
jutting  out  aslant  above  me  for  some  feet. 
Even  a  real  sea-gull'  could  not  have  worked  its 
way  up  without  using  or  spreading  its  wings. 
So  of  course  I  felt  I  must  not  stop  to  think  for 

»  One  of  his  home  nicknames. 


i6        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

one  second,  and  began  climbing  down,  hand 
under  hand,  as  fast  and  as  steadily  as  I  could, 
till  I  reached  the  bottom,  and  (equally  of  course) 
began  to  look  out  for  another  possible  point  of 
ascent  at  the  same  height.  As  I  began  again 
I  must  own  I  felt  like  setting  my  teeth  and 
swearing  I  would  not  come  down  again  alive 
— ^if  I  did  return  to  the  foot  of  the  cliff  again  it 
should  be  in  a  fragmentary  condition,  and  there 
would  not  be  much  of  me  to  pick  up.  I  was 
most  of  the  way  up  again  when  I  heard  a  sudden 
soxmd  as  of  loud  music,  reminding  me  instantly 
of  'the  anthem'  from  the  Eton  Chapel  organ, 
a  little  below  me  to  the  left.  I  knew  it  would 
be  almost  certain  death  to  look  down,  and 
next  minute  there  was  no  need :  I  glanced  aside, 
and  saw  the  opening  of  a  great  hollow  in  the 
upper  cliff,  out  of  which  came  swarming  a  per- 
fect flock  of  'the  others,' '  who  evidently  had 
never  seen  a  wingless  brother  so  near  the  family 
quarters  before.  They  rose  all  about  me  in  a 
heaving  cloud — at  least,  I  really  don't  think 
the  phrase  exaggerates  the  density  of  their 
'congregated  wings' — and  then  scattered.  It 
did  flash  across  me  for  a  minute  how  nasty  it 
would  be  if  they  flew  at  me  and  went  for  my 
indefensible  eyes;  but,  of  course,  they  never 
thought  of  anything  so  unnatural  and  unfra- 
ternal.    I  was  a  little  higher,  quite  near  the  top 

'  Sea-gulls,  of  which  he  loved  to  speak  as  being  his  brothers  and 
sisters — the  "others,"  in  home  parlance. 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        17 

or  well  within  hail  of  it,  when  I  thought  how 
queer  it  would  be  if  my  very  scanty  foothold 
gave  way;  and  at  that  very  minute  it  did  (I 
assure  you  on  my  word  of  honour  that  this  is 
the  exact  truth,  strange  as  it  sounds  and  is), 
and  I  swung  in  the  air  by  my  hands  from  a  ledge 
on  the  cliff  which  just  gave  room  for  the  fingers 
to  cling  and  hold  on.  There  was  a  projection 
of  rock  to  the  left  at  which  I  flung  out  my  feet 
sideways  and  just  reached  it ;  this  enabled  me  to 
get  breath  and  crawl  at  full  speed  (so  to  say) 
up  the  remaining  bit  of  cliff.  At  the  top  I 
had  not  strength  enough  left  to  turn  or  stir;  I 
lay  on  my  right  side  helpless,  and  just  had  time 
to  think  what  a  sell  (and  what  an  inevitable 
one)  it  would  be  if  I  were  to  roll  back  over  the 
edge  after  all,  when  I  became  imconscious — as 
suddenly  and  utterly  and  painlessly  as  I  did 
many  years  afterwards  when  I  was  'picked up 
at  sea'  by  a  Norman  fishing  boat  upwards  of 
three  miles  (they  told  me)  off  the  coast  of  Etre- 
tat,  and  could  just  clutch  hold  of  the  oar  they 
held  out;  'but  that  is  not  in  this  story — ^which 
I  only  hope  is  not  too  long  for  the  reader.'  On 
returning  to  conscious  life  I  found  a  sheep's 
nose  just  over  mine,  and  the  poor  good  fellow- 
creature's  eyes  gazing  into  my  face  with  a  look 
of  such  kindly  pity  and  sympathy  as  well  as 
surprise  and  perplexity  that  I  never  ought  to 
have  eaten  a  mutton-chop  again.  I  couldn't 
help  bursting  into  such  a  shout  of  laughter  (I 


i8        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

did  the  same  thing  when  I  'came  to'  in  the  boat 
.  .  .)  that  the  sheep  scuttled  off  like  a  boy  out 
of  bounds  at  sight  of  one  of  the  masters.     I 
don't  think  I  was  ever  so  hungry  as  when  I  got 
back  to  East  Dene,  and  found  that  everybody 
was  out  looking  for  me  (or  so  the  servants  said). 
After  eating  and  sleeping  I  had  an  interview 
with  my  mother,  of  which  I  should  not  care  to 
write   except    to    the   daughter    of   yours.     Of 
course  she  wanted  to  know  why  I  had  done 
such  a  thing,  and  when  I  told  her  she  laughed 
a  short  sweet  laugh  most  satisfactory  to  the 
young  ear,  and  said,  *  Nobody  ever  thought  you 
were  a  coward,  my  boy.'     I  said  that  was  all 
very  well:  but  how  could  I  tell  till  I  tried?     '  But 
you  won't  do  it  again?'  she  said.     I  repHed, 
of  course  not — where  could  be  the  fun?     I  knew 
now  that  it  could  be  done,  and  I  only  wanted 
to  do  it  because  nobody  thought  it  could." 

How  little  those  who  rejoiced  and  gave  thanks 
for  the  safety  of  a  beloved  son  and  brother  could 
have  foreseen  the  loss  that  might  in  one  moment 
have  accrued  to  the  world  and  the  century,  or 
the  halo  of  association  that  will  surround  Culver 
Cliff  for  ever,  at  least  as  long  as  Swinburne's 
name  is  remembered! 

I  have  alluded  to  his  fondness  for  riding,  an 
amusement  which  we  often  shared.     I  am  boimd 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        19 

to  confess  that  if  a  fearless  he  was  also  a  reck- 
less rider,  and  more  than  once  I  remember  his 
start  ending  in  disaster.  On  one  occasion  we 
were  riding  together  on  the  downs,  and  he  got 
a  bad  fall — probably  from  carelessness  with  a 
clumsy  pony.  The  old  groom,  who  was  always 
my  attendant  in  those  days,  feared  his  spine  was 
injured,  and  galloped  away  to  procure  a  convey- 
ance to  bring  him  home,  leaving  us  two  on  the 
down.  After  a  few  minutes  Algernon  picked 
himself  up,  and  found  he  could  walk,  so  we 
started  to  walk  home,  leading  our  ponies,  and 
arrived,  much  to  the  relief  of  our  relatives  (who 
had  been  greatly  concerned)  before  any  convey- 
ance appeared.  Another  time — but  this  was 
earlier — he  was  thrown  against  a  stone  wall  by 
a  refractory  mount  and  cut  his  head.  We  were 
to  be  taken  that  night  to  hear  a  lecture  on 
Macbeth,  and  I  remember  Algernon  going  with 
his  head  bound  up.  These  were  only  two  of 
many  mishaps :  one  later  took  place  while  he  was 
at  Oxford,  when,  needless  to  say,  I  was  not  in  his 
company.     I  believe  it  was  a  pretty  bad  spill. 

But,  nevertheless,  for  years — all  my  unmarried 
life — we  rode  together  constantly  and  without 
mischance.  We  would  gallop  along  wildly, 
much  absorbed  in  our  conversation,  but  no  harm 


20        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

ever  came  to  me,  nor  did  he  ever  play  dangerous 
tricks  with  his  companion. 

Among  the  many  visits  which  he  paid  to  us, 
two  stand  out  particularly  in  my  remembrance: 
one  in  Scotland  (dtiring  his  college  vacation) 
and  one  in  the  winter  of  1863-4.  During  the 
former,  I  remember  his  trying  to  cross  a  stream 
by  a  fallen  tree  lying  across  it;  he  went  a  little 
way  on  all  fours  and  then  fell  plump  into  the 
burn.  It  had  a  stony  bottom,  and  he  must 
have  come  down  pretty  hard;  but  except  for 
the  sharp  pain  at  first  no  bad  effect  followed. 

The  latter  visit  in  the  Isle  of  Wight  was,  I 
think,  the  longest  time  he  ever  stayed  with  us 
continuously,  and  was  a  delightful  as  well  as  a 
memorable  time.  His  own  family  was  abroad, 
and  he  stayed,  I  think,  from  October  to  Febru- 
ary. At  that  time  he  was  engaged  on  Atalanta 
in  Calydon — his  first  great  play  on  the  model  of 
the  Greek  drama.  It  was  begim  when  he  came 
to  us,  but  the  first  time  I  ever  heard  the  opening 
chorus,  "When  the  hounds  of  Spring  are  on 
Winter's  traces,"  was  on  horseback,  and  I  know 
to  this  day  the  exact  strip  of  road,  between  New- 
port and  Shorwell,  where  he  repeated  it  to  me. 
In  our  library,  often  alone  with  my  mother  and 
myself,  much  of  the  work  was  written  out,  and 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        21 

the  table  would  be  strewn  with  the  big  sheets  of 
manuscript.  But  I  think  none  of  those  who 
have  since  read  and  delighted  in  Atalanta  would 
believe  the  amount  of  "nonsense"  which  was 
going  on  side  by  side  with  the  famous  work. 
We  were  both  devoted  to  the  game  of  houts  rimes, 
and  used  to  set  each  other  pages  and  pages  of 
houts  J  always  of  a  comic  nature;  and  then  he 
used  to  read  them  aloud  when  completed,  in 
the  evening.  We  were  also  fond  of  what  are 
now  called  "Limericks,"  and  he  had  a  way  of 
finding  the  most  ridiculous  and  expressive 
rhymes  to  names  of  all  sorts.  I  recollect  one 
evening  he  said  of  a  name  casually  mentioned, 
"I  wonder  if  one  could  find  a  rhyme  to  Atkin- 
son," and  then  immediately  spouted: 

"A  tree  with  all  its  catkins  on 
Was  planted  by  Miss  Atkinson!" 

But  his  diversions  were  not  wholly  nonsensical, 
for  at  this  time  he  wrote  and  gave  to  me,  ab- 
solutely, for  a  boys*  story  which  I  was  writing, 
a  beautiful  little  "Morality"  play,  called  The 
Pilgrimage  of  Pleasure.  The  book  in  which 
it  appeared,  long  out  of  print,  but  republished 
within  the  last  few  years,  was  called  The  Children 
of  the  Chapel.     We  had  great  amusement  over 


22        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

the  story,  which  I  may  almost  call  a  joint  pro- 
duction, he  making  suggestions  and  giving  me 
endless  references  and  information,  the  tale 
being  historical.  Another  story  which  I  was 
engaged  upon  at  the  time  was  more  or  less 
revised  by  him.  ^  He  also  could  spare  time  and 
attention  to  help  me  with  some  very  rudiment- 
ary Greek  studies  I  had  begun,  and  selecting 
passages  which  we  read  together. 

I  think  it  was  the  following  autumn  which  he 
spent  in  Cornwall.  My  parents  and  I  were  in 
Scotland,  and  I  received  constant  letters  from 
him.  Among  a  great  deal  that  is  comic  and 
clever,  but  only  intelligible  to  one  who  understood 
our  jokes  and  "characters"  under  which  we 
delighted  to  write,  are  some  charming  and 
graphic  descriptions.  Here  is  one  under  date 
of  September  2nd  (1864): 

"I  could  have  wished  for  [your]  company 
yesterday  night  when  we  took  out  horses,  bor- 
rowed from  a  neighbouring  farmer,  and  rode 
through  the  dusk  and  the  dark  to  the  adjacent 
city  of  Boscastle.     This  important  and  flourish- 

'  This  story  was  rewritten  and  published  years  after,  under  the 
title  of  Tnisty  in  Fight.  To  the  last  Algernon  would  inscribe  in  the 
flyleaf  of  any  book  he  gave  me — they  were  many — the  name  of  one 
of  my  boy-heroes,  assuming  as  the  donor  that  of  one  of  his  own.  I 
mention  this  as  an  example  of  his  extraordinary  playfulness  and 
condescension  to  "childish  things." 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        23 

ing  seaport  does  not  exactly  boast  of  a  highway 
to  the  sea,  but  it  has  a  path  cut  or  worn  in  the 
slope  of  the  down,  along  which  we  let  our  horses 
(being  surefooted  Cornish  ones  who  know  the 
nature  of  their  sea  and  their  down  .  .  .  )  feel 
their  way  till  we  came  out  one  after  another  on 
a  narrow  standing  place  of  rocks,  breaking 
sharply  down  to  the  sea  on  both  sides.  This 
ridge  of  rocks  shuts  in  the  harbour,  and  the 
sea  having  incautiously  poured  in  through  a 
strait  between  the  ridge  and  the  cliff  opposite 
turns  twice  at  right  angles  upon  itself  and  makes 
a  sort  of  double  harbour;  one  parallel  with  the 
outer  sea,  blocked  out  by  the  rocks  to  which  we 
had  ridden;  the  other  running  straight  up  the 
valley  to  the  houses  of  the  little  town  as  thus: 

11 and  as  there  is  no  beach  or  shore 
of  any  kind,  you  can  imagine  how 

the  sea  I  swings  to  and  fro  between  the 
cliffs,  foams  and  swells,  beats  and  baffles  itself 
against  the  steep  faces  of  rock.  I  should  guess 
it  must  be  unique  in  England.  Seen  from  above 
and  on  horseback  it  was  very  queer,  dark  grey 
swollen  water,  caught  as  it  were  in  a  trap,  and 
heaving  with  rage  against  both  sides  at  once, 
edged  with  long  panting  lines  of  incessant  foam 
that  swung  and  lapped  along  the  deep  steep 
cliffs  without  breaking,  and  had  not  room  to 
roll  at  ease.  My  horse  was  much  the  pluckier, 
and  made  forward  as  if  on  a  road;  would,  I 
believe,  have  tried  to  mount   the  rough  rock- 


24        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

hewn  steps  from  this  natural  platform  to  a  sort 
of  beacon  at  the  mouth  of  the  inlet;  but  seeing 
the  difficulties  of  redescending  (which  was  a 
delicate  business  as  it  was)  I  turned  him  round 
after  a  bit  of  ascent.  It  was  not  unexciting, 
especially  by  a  grey  and  glimmering  night  with- 
out moon  or  star.  Had  it  been  on  a  smuggling 
expedition  it  would  have  been  sweet  indeed. 
Having  ridden  back  towards  the  scattered  lights 
of  the  town,  and  got  on  a  high  road  again  instead 
of  a  cliif  path  just  above  the  sea,  I  tried  my 
beast's  pace  at  a  gallop,  having  already  tested 
the  goodness  of  his  head  and  sureness  of  his  feet, 
in  which  he  matched  any  possible  Alpine  mule. 
He  went  very  well  and  we  tore  over  the  ground 
in  the  night  at  such  a  rate  that  we  all  but  banged 
against  late  carts  in  the  lanes,  and  quite  electri- 
fied the  stray  population.  I  have  bathed  twice, 
but  the  sea  is  very  treacherous  and  tiring;  no 
sand,  hardly  any  beach  even  at  low  water  in 
the  narrow  bays,  sudden  steep  banks,  shelving 
rocks,  and  sea  pitching  violently  in  the  entrance 
of  the  bays;  so  that  where  there  are  rocks  to 
take  breath  at  one  can't  make  for  them  lest  the 
sea  should  stave  one's  ribs  in  against  the  reefs; 
and  a  sea  that  pitches  from  side  to  side  without 
breakers  or  rollers,  and  has  no  resting  places 
except  on  the  high  and  dry  rocks  inland,  takes 
it  out  of  one  in  swimming  much  more  than  one 
thinks.  We  are  twenty-five  miles  from  the 
nearest    railway,    and    Clatt    [our    own    Scotch 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        25 

village]  is  as  it  were  Babylon  or  Nineveh  to 
our  post  town — Camelford,  which  is  six  miles 
inland.  Nothing  can  be  funnier  than  these 
villages  except  the  downs  and  glens  in  which 
they  are  set.  The  sea- views  are,  of  course, 
splendid  beyond  praise.  On  one  headland  (split 
now  into  two,  divided  by  a  steep  isthmus  of 
rock  between  two  gulfs  of  sea,  not  wide  enough 
for  two  to  walk  abreast  across)  is  the  double 
ruin,  one  half  facing  the  other,  of  the  old  castle 
or  palace  of  the  kings  of  Cornwall.  Opposite 
on  a  high  down  is  the  old  church,  black  with 
rain  and  time  and  storm,  black  at  least  in  the 
tower,  and  grey  in  the  body.  The  outer  half 
of  the  castle,  on  the  headland  beyond  the  isth- 
mus, is  on  the  very  edge  (and  partly  over  the 
edge  and  on  the  slant)  of  the  cliff;  and  has  inde- 
scribable views  of  the  double  bay,  broken  cliffs, 
and  outer  sea.  Practically,  the  total  want  of 
beach  at  any  time  of  tide  is  a  great  loss." 

The  same  letter  relates  in  an  amusing  manner 
how  he  and  his  companion  were  "lodged  and 
boarded  in  the  schoolhouse,"  where  he  once 
overheard  a  flogging  going  on  in  the  school- 
room, to  which  his  Etonian  ears  were  specially 
sensitive — and  sympathetic.  Also  he  describes 
a  local  hunt  in  which  he  joined:  "how  after 
100,000,000  false  starts  the  scent  was  lost  after 
all,  if  indeed  it  ever  existed.     But  wc  had  some 


26   ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

good  gallops  on  our  own  hook,  and  one  lark 
.  .  .  which  was  that  your  cousin  really  lifted 
a  gate  off  its  hinges  for  a  female  to  pass.  Said 
female  herself  much  of  a  lark,  a  neighbouring 
clergyman's  wife,  semi-Spanish,  semi-Irish, 
awfully  hospitable  and  good-natured,  not  to 
call  vulgar,  because  natural;  but  such  a  comic, 
boisterous  set  of  people  as  she  was  at  the  head  of ! 
Clergymen,  agents,  farmers,  all  much  alike,  and 
also  very  hospitable." 

In  a  postscript  to  this  letter — of  which  the 
latter  part  of  the  MS.  is  a  little  more  wildly 
erratic  than  even  his  ordinary  penmanship  of 
the  period — he  apologizes  for  the  writing,  "as 
a  needle  and  a  lump  of  black  mud  are  the  only 
writing  implements  at  hand." 

A  letter  of  2nd  October,  also  from  Tintagel, 
gives  an  account  of  one  of  hi^  seaside  escapes: 

"The  aforesaid'  came  to  see  me,  who  have 
had  an  adventure  which  might  have  been  serious 
but  has  only  resulted  in  laming  one  foot  for  a 
day  or  two,  I  hope.  ...  I  had  to  run  round  a 
point  of  land  which  the  sea  was  rising  round, 
or  be  cut  off  in  a  bay  of  which  to  my  cost  I  had 
just  found  the  cliffs  impracticable;  so  without 
boots  or  stockings  I  just  ran  at  it  and  into  the 

'  A  boy  friend  staying  in  the  neighbourhood. 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        27 

water  and  up  or  down  over  some  awfully  sharp 
and  shell-encrusted  rocks  which  cut  my  feet  to 
fragments,  had  twice  to  plunge  again  into  the 
sea,  which  was  filling  all  the  coves  and  swinging 
and  swelling  heavily  between  the  rocks;  once 
fell  flat  in  it,  and  got  so  thrashed  and  licked  that 
I  might  have  been  in 's  clutches  [al- 
luding to  characters  in  a  story],  and  at  last  got 
over  the  last  reef  and  down  on  the  sand  of  a 
safe  bay,  a  drenched  rag,  and  with  feet  that  just 
took  me  home  (three-quarters  of  a  mile  or  so 
and  uphill  mainly  with  stones)  half  in  and  half 
out  of  the  boots  which  I  had  just  saved  with 
one  hand ;  and  then  the  right  foot  began  to  bleed 
like  a  pig,  and  I  found  a  deep  cut  which  was 
worse  than  any  ever  inflicted  by  a  birch  to  the 
best  of  my  belief,  for  it  was  no  end  bad  yester- 
day, and  to-day  makes  it  hopeless  to  walk 
except  on  tiptoe,  but  as  I  wouldn't  have  it 
dressed  or  bothered  I  hope  it  will  soon  heal." 


In  a  later  letter  (October  26th)  he  says:  "M}^ 
foot  is  well  enough  now  to  be  quite  serviceable, 
and  after  full  three  weeks'  close  and  often  soli- 
tary confinement,  I  enjoy  getting  out  among 
the  downs  and  cliffs  so  much  that  I  hardl}^  know 
if  I  shall  be  able  to  tear  myself  away  from  my 
last  chance  of  the  sea  this  week." 

The  autumn  of  that  year  found  us  again  both 


28        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

in  London,  and  he  was  a  frequent  guest  at  my 
father's  house  at  Chelsea.  I  think  it  was  at 
that  time  that  he  wrote  some  chapters  of  a 
novel,  which  never  saw  the  light,  or,  as  far  as  I 
know,  was  completed.  He  used  to  read  me  bits 
of  the  MS.  of  an  afternoon  when  he  happened 
to  come  in.  I  do  not  know  what  was  the  plot 
of  the  story,  but  I  recollect  some  of  the  charac- 
ters— one  being  the  bright  young  lovable  school- 
boy he  delighted  in  portraying,  in  constant 
scrapes,  but  noble  and  honourable  through  all; 
and  a  tutor,  who  bid  fair  to  be  the  "villain  of 
the  piece."  There  was  a  description  of  a  bathing 
place  imder  the  rocky  cliffs,  taken,  no  doubt, 
from  the  scenes  of  his  Cornwall  scrambles.  The 
plot  was  in  no  way  connected  with  his  late  novel, 
Love's  Cross  Currents. 

During  one  of  our  residences  in  London, 
Algernon  took  my  father  and  me  to  see  Dante 
E.ossetti's  studio  and  house.  The  artist  received 
us  most  kindly,  and  showed  us  his  treasures, 
paintings,  and  pencil  sketches.  The  remem- 
brance of  that  visit  often  comes  back  to  me  when 
I  come  across  the  paintings  I  then  saw  for  the 
first  time. 

My  marriage  in  1865,  and  subsequent  resi- 
dence for  much  of  the  year  in  Scotland,  natu- 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        29 

rally  caused  something  of  a  gap  in  our  constant 
correspondence  and  intercourse,  though  he  was 
always  the  same  when  we  did  meet.  I  have 
been  unable  to  trace  the  letter  he  wrote  when 
I  annoimced  to  him  my  engagement,  and  said 
that  as  he  had  always  been  to  me  like  an  elder 
brother,  I  should  like  to  feel  that  I  had  his 
approval.  I  know  that  he  did  write  most  kindly, 
saying  that  "If  it  was  A.  or  any  of  my  sisters, 
I  could  not  feel  more  sincerely  interested,"  or 
words  to  that  effect.  Another  short  letter  in 
answer  to  one  on  business  is  equally  kind. 

Atalanta  m  Calydon  astonished  the  world  of 
literature  that  same  simimer;  and  a  presenta- 
tion copy  in  white  vellum,  with  the  exquisite 
gold-shell  ornamentation  designed  by  D.  Ros- 
setti,  and  which  had  been  minutely  described 
to  me  while  under  discussion,  was  among  the 
most  valued  of  my  wedding  gifts. 

We  met,  not  long  after,  when  both  visiting 
at  an  uncle's  (Lord  Ashbumham's)  house  in 
the  coimtry;  and  though  nothing  of  particular 
moment  occurred,  I  chiefly  remember  lively  and 
merry  games  in  the  evening  with  him  and  the 
large  party  of  cousins,  such  games  as  "conse- 
quences" and  the  like. 

Algernon  often  visited  my  mother  after  my 


30        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

father's  death.  He  chiefly  enjoyed  staying 
near  the  sea,  his  own  old  home  having  passed 
into  other  hands.  All  his  life  he  continued  to  love 
bathing  and  swimming,  and  only  absence  from 
the  sea  prevented  his  enjoyment  of  this  pursuit. 

Gradually,  with  the  passing  of  years,  the  old 
correspondence  was  taken  up  again ;  on  his  part, 
at  all  events,  with  no  less  of  the  old  brightness 
and  energy.  And  in  the  occasional  visits  to  the 
Putney  home — where,  in  due  course,  children 
and  grandchildren  were  allowed  to  make  the 
acquaintance  of  "Cousin  Hadji,"  old  times  and 
memories  were  called  up,  old  and  new  books  were 
looked  at  and  discussed,  and  hardly  an  old  joke 
found  to  be  forgotten. 

These  cannot  be  called  early  memories,  and 
my  reminiscences  must  draw  to  a  close.  They 
may  be  interesting  as  showing  a  side  of  the  poet's 
character  imknown  to  the  world,  yet  surely  not 
the  less  honourable  and  lovable.  I  never  met 
with  a  character  more  thoroughly  loyal,  chival- 
rous and — though  some  of  his  utterances  may 
seem  to  contradict  it — reverent-minded.  His 
veneration  for  the  aged,  for  parents,  women,  and 
Httle  children — the  simple  worship  of  infancy, 
of  which  he  has  left  us  so  many  exquisite  records 
— are  unlike  any  other  man's  that  I  ever  knew. 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        31 

And  whatever  his  religious  opinions  were  or 
were  not,  however  much  they  had  departed 
from  those  of  our  upbringing — as  doubtless 
they  did  in  later  days — I  never,  in  our  years 
of  unfettered  and  most  familiar  intercourse, 
remember  him  to  have  said  anything  to  shock 
or  distress  me,  or  anything  that  was  undesirable 
for  me,  as  child  or  girl,  to  hear.  And  I  would 
most  emphatically  assert  that  however  such 
change  of  views  as  I  have  mentioned  might — • 
as  it  unavoidably  must — have  caused  pain, 
it  never  for  a  moment  interfered  with  or  lessened 
the  love,  loyalty,  and  reverence  given  by  Alger- 
non to  his  own  family,  or  their  affectionate 
intercourse  with  him. 

In  this  connection  it  is  perhaps  not  unfitting 
that  I  should  say  a  few  words  about  a  circum- 
stance likely  to  have  caused  some  surprise  and 
misapprehension  shortly  after  his  death,  and 
to  have  been  liable  to  an  entirely  mistaken 
interpretation.  I  allude  to  the  absence  of  any 
reference  to  his  family  in  his  will. 

Algernon  was  before  all  things  utterly  im- 
businesslike.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  his 
attitude  towards  money  matters,  and  business 
of  any  kind,  was  that  of  a  child — entirely  irre- 
sponsible.    He  simply  left  all  such,  during  the 


32        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

last  forty  years  of  his  life  at  any  rate,  to  Mr. 
Watts-Dunton,  the  friend  and  adviser  in  whom 
he  placed  the  most  implicit  faith.  No  one 
who  knows  the  terms  of  affection  that  existed 
between  Algernon  and  his  nearest  relatives  to 
the  last,  can  for  the  moment  think  that  the  omis- 
sion of  their  names  from  his  testamentary  docu- 
ment was  due  to  any  possible  coolness  or  lack 
of  affection.  I  know  it  has  been  alleged  that 
religious  differences  had  made  a  breach  between 
him  and  his  family,  and  for  this  statement  I 
can  positively  affirm  that  there  was  no  founda- 
tion whatever.  His  letters  to  his  family,  through 
a  long  course  of  years,  absolutely  disprove  any 
such  assertion,  even  were  no  other  testimony 
forthcoming. 

With  all  his  tremendous  fund  of  wit  or  non- 
sense, nothing  profane,  vulgar,  or  risque  ever 
cropped  up.  His  parodies  of  the  didactic  or 
moral  style  of  nursery  rhyme  and  story  are 
inimitably  ludicrous,  often  full  of  a  fine  satire, 
but  absolutely  harmless. 

I  find  among  the  letters  from  Cornwall  a  few 
more  points  of  general  interest  which  I  may 
be  allowed  to  quote  before  closing.  These  are 
some  remarks  upon  a  newly-published  set  of 
poems  by  Tennyson.     He  says: 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        33 

"How  satisfied  I  am  that  [your]  opinion  of 
Tennyson's  last  should  so  exactly  coincide  with 
mine.  After  the  four  great  ones  you  mention 
I  put  the  Valley  of  Cauteretz,  which  I  think 
very  musical  and  perfect.  Boadicea  is  in  Galli- 
ambics,  a  metre  in  which  there  is  only  one 
other  poem  extant,  the  Atys  of  Catullus;  the 
rules  are  too  long  and  too  intricate  to  give  here, 
even  if  I  remembered  the  whole  scheme,  which 
I  don't;  but  it  is  in  Cookesley's  Eton  edition  of 
Catullus  prepared  for  the  'young  mind,'  where 
you  may  safely  seek  it.  I  tried  ...  to  do  my 
week's  verses  in  it  once,  and  my  tutor  said  it 
was  no  metre  at  all  and  he  wouldn't  take  them, 
because  it  was  an  impertinence  to  show  such  a 
set  up,  so  it  counted  as  if  I  had  done  nothing, 
and  the  consequences  were  tragic." 

In  another  letter  he  refers  to  the  episode 
again: 

"I  need  not  say  that  I  have  not  the  pluck  to 
try  my  hand  again  at  Galliambics.  ...  I 
should  feel  at  every  line  as  if  I  were  writing  down 
my  own  name  in  the  bill:  besides  I  might  make 
false  quantities — and  then  I  .  .  .  And  then  I 
showed  my  verses  indignantly  {after  the  cata- 
strophe) to  another  master,  and  he  said  they 
were  very  good,  and  there  was  but  one  small 
slip  in  them,  hard  as  the  metre  was;  and  I  told 
my  tutor  with  impudent  triumph  (knowing  he 


34        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

had  done  his  very  worst),  and  he  was  shut  up 
I  can  tell  you  .  .  .  but  that  did  not  heal  the 
cuts  or  close  the  scars  which  had  imprinted  on 
the  mind  and  body  of [a  fictitious  school- 
boy character  with  whom  he  identifies  himself 
here],  a  just  horror  of  strange  metres." 

Surely  it  does  not  add  to  Eton's  fair  records 
that  she  should  thus  have  failed  to  recognize 
genius,  and  given  punishment  as  the  meed  of 
an  exceptionally  skilful,  if  erratic,  piece  of  work! 

The  painful  association  with  the  "strange 
metre"  chngs  to  him  through  more  pages,  for 
in  another  letter,  in  which  he  recommends  "the 
two  Iphigenias  of  Euripides"  as  a  study, 
saying: 

"They  are  generally  very  easy,  and  if  you 
find  the  choruses  hard  you  can  skip  or  reserve 
them  quite  well." 

He  specially  recommends  the  Iphigenia  in 
Aulis — 

"the  tents  and  stars  and  sea  all  stand  out  so 
clearly  in  the  first  few  verses,  which  are  in  the 
famiHar  and  fondly  remembered  anapaestic 
metre — none  of  your  blessed  Galliambics  or 
such  like  'impertinent  eccentricities,'  as  they 
were  well  called  in  my  case." 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        35 

The  "fond  remembrance"  points  to  our  houts 
rimes  games,  in  which  we  frequently  amused 
ourselves  by  using  the  anapaestic  metre.  But, 
however  he  might  speak  or  write  of  others,  every 
metre  was  docile  and  plastic  in  his  hands;  as 
he  said  once  jestingly  to  me,  he  thought  he  had 
tamed  them  or  broken  them  all  in,  to  do  what 
he  wanted.  One,  which  seems  peculiarly  his 
own,  is  founded  on  the  old  English  line: 

"They  shall  ride  upon  ocean  wide  with  hempen  bridle 
and  horse  of  tree," 

which  he  gave  me  as  a  sample  and  measure  of 
the  metre  when  I  audaciously  attempted  to 
"play  with  it"  myself. 

I  know  no  more  beautiful  example  of  his 
anapaestic  work  than  a  fragmentary  translation 
of  a  portion  of  The  Rhythm  of  Bernard  de  Mor- 
laix,  done,  I  think,  rather  at  my  instigation, 
during  his  long  stay  with  us  in  1864.  We  had 
been  looking  at  Dr.  Neale's  well-known  version 
opposite  the  Latin  original,  which  is  in  the  metre 
above  named.  It  was  on  a  Sunday  morning; 
and  I  coming  in  from  church  found  him  sitting 
in  the  bow- window  of  our  library  with  this  paper, 
and  he  said:  "While  you  have  been  playing  the 
organ  I  have  been  making  anapaests  for  you" 


36        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

(or  words  to  that  effect).  I  give  the  extract  in 
full,  and  those  acquainted  with  the  original  can 
appreciate  the  skill  and  force  and  faithfulness 
of  the  rendering. 

specimen  of  a  projected  version  of 
Bernard's  rhythm 

0  land  without  guilt,  strong  city,  safe  built  in  a  mar- 

vellous place, 

1  cling  to  thee,  ache  for  thee,  sing  to  thee,  wake  for  thee, 

watch  for  thy  face : 
Full  of  cursing  and  strife  are  the  days  of  my  life;  with 

their  sins  they  are  fed, 
Out  of  sin  is  the  root,  unto  sin  is  the  fruit,  in  their  sins 

they  are  dead. 
No  deserving  of  mine  can  make  answer  to  thine,  neither 

I  unto  thee; 
I  a  child  of  God's  wrath,  made  subject  to  death,  what 

good  thing  is  in  me  ? 
Yet  through  faith  I  require  thee,  through  hope  I  desire 

thee,  in  hope  I  hold  fast, 
Crying  out,  day  and  night,  that  my  soul  may  have  sight 

of  thy  joy  at  the  last. 
Me,  even  me  hath  the  Father  set  free,  and  hath  bidden 

come  in : 
In  sin  hath  He  found  me,  from  sin  hath  unbound  me, 

and  purged  me  of  sin. 
In  His  strength  am  I  glad,  whom  my  weakness  made 

sad;  I  that  slept  am  awake; 
With  the  eyes  that  wept,  with  the  spirit  that  slept,  I 

give  thanks  for  His  sake. 
Things  weak  He  makes  sure,  things  unclean  He  makes 

pure,  with  His  fresh  watersprings ; 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE        37 

Throughout  all  lands  He  goeth,  for  all  things  He  floweth, 

and  halloweth  all  things. 
O  home  of  salvation,  a  chosen  nation,  a  royal  race 
Doth  build  and  possess  thee,  increase  thee  and  bless  thee, 

engird  and  embrace; 
Every  heart  boweth  down  to  that  grace  which  doth 

crown  thee,  O  Sion,  O  peace! 
Time  is  there  none  in  thee,  stars  neither  sun  in  thee  rise 

not  nor  cease; 
Of  the  saints  art  thou  trod,  and  made  glorious  of  God; 

thou  art  full  of  thy  Lord; 
And  the  sound  of  thee  rings  from  the  great  ten  strings 

of  the  decachord. 
Thou  hast  lilies  made  sweet  for  their  maiden  feet  who 

were  clothed  with  lowliness; 
And  roses  blood-red,   as  a  saint's  blood  shed,  in  the 

beauty  of  holiness. 
With  His  Wings  He  shall  cover  thee,  He  that  rules  over 

thee  even  the  Son, 
The  Mystic  Lion,  the  Lamb  out  of  Sion,  the  God  which 

is  One; 
Purged  of  all  revelling,  clear  of  all  travailing,  pure  of 

all  strife, 
Land  of  glad  hours,  made  fair  with  new  flowers,  and 

sweet  with  new  life. 


X  have  now,  I  think,  put  down  my  principal 
early  recollections  of  my  cousin.  Nimiberless 
little  traits  may  be  omitted,  as  many  more, 
doubtless,  have  passed  into  the  mists  of  oblivion. 
When  people  are  very  familiar  they  do  not  take 
note  of  many  things  which  might  strike  more 
casual  acquaintance. 

1^     U  O    1  ri 


38        ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

I  shall  only  be  too  glad  if  the  reminiscences, 
imperfect  as  they  are,  may  serve  to  fill  up  gaps 
in  any  finished  life  which  may  be  given  to  the 
world;  too  proud  if  any  word  of  mine  may  help 
that  world  to  know  more  of  his  fearlessness,  his 
manliness,  his  highmindedness,  tenderness,  and 
infinite  condescension.  To  us  who  knew  him 
he  will  ever  be  less  the  brilliant  and  epoch- 
making  genius  than  the  affectionate  loyal- 
hearted  kinsman  whom  to  know  was  to  love. 


THE    LADY    JANE    SWINBURNE 


EXTRACTS  FROM 

THE  PRIVATE  LETTERS  OF 

ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 


39 


EXTRACTS  FROM 

THE  PRIVATE  LETTERS  OF 

ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 

editor's  note 

THE  letters  of  Swinburne  from  which  the 
following  extracts  are  drawn  were  placed 
in  my  hands  by  his  youngest  and  last  surviving 
sister  before  her  death,  with  full  permission  to 
make  any  use  of  them  in  the  sketch  I  proposed 
to  publish.  It  is  always  a  difficult  and  delicate 
matter  to  make  a  selection,  among  private 
letters,  of  what  is  allowable  or  advisable  to 
publish — especially  in  consideration  of  the  ex- 
treme dislike  to  publicity  shared  by  the  writer 
and  the  receivers  of  such  letters  as  are  before  us. 
They  were  found,  however,  to  contain  so  many 
interesting  references,  so  many  exquisite  de- 
scriptions of  places  and  persons,  and  so  many 
sentiments  and  expressions  of  personal  opinion, 
as  to  throw  in  various  cases  a  fresh  light  upon 
the  character  of  the  great  man  who  wrote  them, 
and  to  place  that  character  before  the  world  in 

41 


42  LETTERS 

quite  a  new  aspect.  Thus  I  have  allowed  my- 
self to  quote  freely  from  the  descriptive  passages, 
and  in  the  quotations  of  a  more  intimate  kind 
I  endeavoured  to  choose  those  that  reveal  his 
true  nature,  and  unaltered  affection  for  his 
family. 

I  have  endeavoured  to  keep  the  excerpts 
more  or  less  together,  according  to  their  subjects 
— whether  relating  to  distinguished  persons, 
foreign  travel,  descriptions  of  country,  and  of 
children,  or  concerned  with  his  own  works; 
and  the  more  personal  extracts,  as  showing  the 
terms  on  which  he  stood  with  his  relatives — 
giving  the  periods  as  far  as  possible  in  chrono- 
logical order.  The  years  are  not  in  all  cases 
given,  but  the  references  and  the  hand- 
writing enable  them  to  be  placed  with  fair 
accuracy. 

Swinburne's  handwriting  underwent  a  con- 
siderable change  during  his  lifetime.  As  a 
schoolboy  and  even  in  his  Oxford  days,  it  is 
small  and  cramped,  requiring  some  trouble  in 
deciphering.  Later,  it  becomes  larger  and  dis- 
tincter,  though  often  exceedingly  rugged — espe- 
cially after  he  had  sustained  an  injury  to  the 
wrist.  At  the  middle  period  it  shows  quite  a 
clear  small  type  of  character,  and  last  of  all 


COLOGNE  43 

becomes  very  bold  and  distinct,  much  larger, 
but  really  easier  to  read  than  type-script. 

The  first  batch  of  letters  are  the  earliest  in 
the  collection,  and  give  an  account  of  the  writer's 
first  visit  to  foreign  countries,  at  the  age  of 
eighteen,  in  company  with  his  maternal  uncle, 
Colonel  the  Honourable  Thomas  Ashbumham. 

JOURNEY  TO  WIESBADEN  IN    1 855 

To  his  Mother 

Cologne, 
July  18,  1855. 

We  have  come  thus  far  on  our  way  safe  and 
well,  though  Uncle  Tom  seems  rather  tired. 
Last  night  we  slept  at  Liege,  and  the  night 
before  at  Calais.  Lord  Sandwich  accompanied 
us  from  London  to  Aix-la-Chapelle,  and  was 
very  good-natured;  he  walked  with  me  over 
Liege  and  showed  me  the  old  Bishop's  Palace, 
with  its  great  cloisters.  I  liked  the  old  city 
very  much;  it  is  so  beautifully  placid,  down 
among  the  hills  in  a  valley,  and  the  country  about 
it  is  most  beautiful;  very  like  Mounces'  on  a 
larger  scale,  and  a  little  less  wild,  but  that  was 

« His  grandfather's  shooting  property  in  Northumberland — 
evidently  very  high  praise,  and  the  comparison  occurs  not  seldom 
in  describing  scenery. 


44  LETTERS 

atoned  for  by  other  kinds  of  beauty:  it  struck 
me  more  than  any  other  part  of  the  cotmtry  we 
have  yet  gone  through.  All  the  hills  are  covered 
with  woods,  but  here  and  there  they  open  into 
smooth  green  lawns,  and  break  into  ravines 
where  the  streams  are  exactly  like  those  of 
Mounces,  and  the  water  just  the  moss-water 
colour.  One  place  was  so  like  the  Tyne  just 
below  Keeldar,  the  railway  turned  suddenly 
and  curved  round  along  the  side  of  a  steep  hill, 
so  that  we  could  see  some  time  before  where  the 
turn  was;  and  the  sim  was  out  brightly  although 
we  left  Liege  in  pouring  rain  and  mist.  The 
whole  way  from  Liege  hither  was  so  perfectly 
lovely  that  I  grudged  the  speed  of  the  railway 
by  which  half  the  beauty  was  lost. 

It  was  very  funny  landing  at  Calais  and  seeing 
the  difference  of  appearance  and  hearing  nothing 
but  French:  the  hotels  at  each  of  our  former 
resting-places  were  much  better  than  this  one, 
and  Cologne  is  awfully  dirty!  The  trains  are 
very  puzzling,  and  at  Malines  we  waited  an 
hour  and  a  quarter. 

Now  I  have  got  the  coast  clear  for  the  Cathe- 
dral here,  and  really  now  I  am  come  to  it  I  don't 
know  what  to  say.  Such  things  are  not  to  be 
jabbered  of.     The  magnificence  bewildered  me 


COLOGNE  CATHEDRAL  45 

on  entering,  the  large  arches  and  beautiful 
windows  and  the  enormous  size  of  the  whole 
building;  it  was  worth  coming  from  anywhere 
to  see.  Uncle  Tom  was  so  good  as  to  come 
with  me  to  the  Cathedral  as  the  guide  spoke 
only  German,  tho'  I  don't  think  he  wanted  to 
come:  and  waited  while  I  saw  the  relics  and 
crosses,  etc.,  in  the  Sacristy,  and  the  Shrine  of 
the  Three  Kings,  which  on  ordinary  days  like 
this  costs  six  francs  to  see,  which  I  willingly 
paid  out  of  my  own  money  and  cheap  for  such 
beautiful  sights. 

The  crosses  of  gold  and  jewels  were  most 
beautiful,  but  the  old  Priest  who  showed  them 
said  they  were  very  heavy,  and  shook  his  head 
and  smiled  at  the  enormous  one  of  silver  which 
the  Bishop  carries  in  Processions.  How  any 
one  can,  I  wonder;  it  is  much  higher  than  a  man, 
and  the  biggest  of  them  all.  The  tomb  of  St. 
Engelbrecht  in  the  Sacristy  is  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  things  I  saw  there,  all  the  carved  work 
and  images  silvergilt.  But  the  shrine  was  best  of 
all.  The  Priest  removed  a  part  at  the  head,  and 
showed  me  the  three  skulls  crowned  and  the 
names  written  in  rubies.  The  bare  dark  skulls 
looked  strange,  but  not,  I  thought,  ugly  or  out  of 
place  in  the  diadems  of  gold  and  pearls.     Every 


46  LETTERS 

pillar  of  the  shrine  is  of  a  different  mosaic  pattern. 
Down  the  sides  are  the  Apostles  and  Prophets; 
at  the  foot  the  Passion  in  separate  groups.  The 
expression  of  the  face  of  each  figure  (one  of 
Our  Saviour  particularly)  looked  wonderfully 
true  on  so  small  a  scale.  The  four  pearls  at 
the  top,  and  some  other  of  the  jewels  about  it 
were  enormous;  I  never  saw  such  a  size.  This 
is  the  best  description  I  can  give  of  the  Shrine; 
there  are  I  am  afraid,  many  other  things  well 
worth  seeing  that  I  had  not  time  for.  I  grudge 
especially  the  view  of  the  whole  Cathedral  from 
above,  and  a  closer  view  of  some  of  the  east 
windows,  the  choir,  and  the  old  frescoes.  But  I 
trust  some  day  that  we  may  all  come  here  and 
see  everything! 

From  the  Cathedral  the  guide  and  I  went  to 
the  Church  of  S.  Ursula,  and  I  saw  the  skulls 
and  bones.  One,  they  call  it  S.  Margaret's, 
has  all  the  teeth  and  is  too  horrid.  The  carved 
work  of  the  Golden  Chamber  (where  all  the  bones 
of  the  1 1 ,000  virgins  are)  was  made  by  the  Huns, 
the  Priest  said,  and  is  very  beautiful.  There 
were  all  sorts  of  relics.  Some  sounded  very 
funny;  there  was  a  thumb  of  S.  Matemus  and 
a  tooth  of  S.  ApoUina.  The  old  Priest  was 
very  nice,  I  think  you  would  have  liked  him; 


COLOGNE  CATHEDRAL  47 

he  was  so  gentle  and  reverent  that  I  took  a 
great  fancy  to  him;  he  showed  me  all  the  work 
and  all  sorts  of  things  in  different  parts;  and  he 
said  I  could  see  S.  Ursula's  tomb  if  I  waited  till 
the  service  was  over,  which  I  did,  and  I  felt 
quite  miserable,  it  was  such  a  wretched  feeling 
that  while  they  all  were  praying,  old  men  and 
tiny  children  kneeling  together,  I  was  not  one 
of  them,  I  was  shut  out  as  it  were.  I  could 
have  sat  down  and  cried,  I  was  so  unhappy. 
How  I  do  trust  that  some  day  all  will  be  able 
to  worship  together  and  no  divisions  and  jeal- 
ousies "keep  us  any  longer  asimder!" 

When  the  service  was  over  I  got  over  these 
feelings  in  examining  the  tomb,  which  was  very 
beautiful,  and  seeing  the  rest  of  the  Church  in 
which  was  nothing  but  the  bones,  which  one  sees 
through  holes  in  the  walls,  with  lattices  all 
along  the  sides  of  the  Chancel. 

I  wanted  very  much  to  see  S.  George's  church 
which  is  said  to  be  so  beautiful,  but  had  no 
time. 

I  walked  quickly  from  S.  Ursula's  church  to 
the  Hotel,  which  is  a  long  way  and  the  streets 
anything  but  clean.  ...  I  have  got  a  bottle 
of  eau-de-Cologne,  at  the  great  huge  shop  here, 
Farina's.      Certainly,      as     the      "Handbook" 


48  LETTERS 

notices,  Cologne  wants  all  its  eau-de-Cologne  to 
counteract  certain  other  perfumes  which  its 
streets  emit;  and  I  cannot  say  that  I  think  it 
would  be  at  all  a  nice  city  but  for  this  eau  and 
the  Cathedral.  The  guide  asseverates  that 
it  once  contained  as  many  churches  as  there 
are  days  in  the  year:  now  there  are  only  25,  I 
believe. 


To  the  same 


Wiesbaden, 
July   17,    1855. 


We  arrived  here  safe  on  Saturday.  .  .  .  We 
had  fine  weather  for  our  journey,  and  the  Rhine 
is  very  beautiful  and  I  think  I  should  have  en- 
joyed it  much  but  for  seeing  it  in  a  muddle  of 
smoking  and  jabbering  fellow-travellers,  and 
missing  half  what  was  worth  seeing  on  board  of 
a  nasty  crowded  steamer.  I  wish  we  could  all 
go  and  see  it  comfortably  together  and  stop  and 
see  whenever  we  liked;  for  I  could  not,  though 
I  tried  hard,  take  any  pleasure  in  steaming 
through  fine  scenery  post-haste  and  missing 
half.  It  was  very  provoking  but  I  don't  think 
I  want  any  more  felicity -hunting;  and  I  can't 
say  either  that  I  like  the  prospect  of  a  month 
here,  tho'  the  gardens  and  lake  are  very  pretty. 


WIESBADEN  49 

...  I  have  just  had  my  first  German  lesson 
and  like  the  man  very  much,  and  he  says  he  is 
very  satisfied  with  my  attention,  etc.  .  .  . 

E will  be  happy  to  hear  that  we  are 

domiciled  with  a  Crimean  soldier,  Captain 
Jolliffe  I  believe  his  name  is,  who  was  at  Alma 
and  Balaklava.  Also  she  will  be  glad  to  hear 
that  he  employs  himself  on  a  crusade  against 
rabbits,  and  has  a  dog  which  kills  them  to 
admiration. 

We  have  got  a  capital  courier,  and  the  night 
we  slept  at  Coblenz  he  and  I  had  a  walk  over  the 
hills  after  sunset,  and  managed  a  good  night 
view  of  the  Rhine  and  Moselle  near  their  junc- 
tion, and  the  surrounding  country.  Certainly 
the  river  is  beautiful,  and  some  of  the  castles 
very  grand  among  their  steep  rocks,  and  the 
woods  and  vineyards  close  down  to  the  great 
broad  stream,  only  the  steamers  were  so  dirty 
and  smoky. 

To  the  same 

Wiesbaden, 

July  28,  1855- 

Last  Tuesday  was  the  duke's  birthday  and 
there  was  an  inspection  of  the  soldiers  and  great 


50  LETTERS 

rejoicings  and  salutes  for  his  coming  only  he  did 
not  come  at  all ;  and  the  ways  were  hung  with  gar- 
lands and  the  lake  was  illuminated  with  coloured 
lamps  hung  all  the  way  round  which  looked 
very  pretty,  by  night. 

And  we  have  been  to  see  the  chapel  built 
by  the  late  Emperor  of  Russia  for  the  burial 
of  the  Duchess  or  somebody  who  married  the 
Duke  of  Bavaria.  It  is  very  beautiful,  the 
Altar  is  marble,  the  rood-screen  painted  in 
water-colours  (I  think)  with  figures  of  the 
Apostles,  and  her  monument  is  very  fine;  and 
they  give  one  list  slippers  to  put  on  for  fear  of 
scratching  the  marble.  Outside  it  is  all  carved 
on  the  portals,  and  has  huge  gilt  doors.  And 
we  drove  through  the  woods  to  the  Duke's 
himting-place  and  went  all  over  it,  and  there 
was  a  splendid  view;  and  we  walked  to  Sauren- 
berg  (?)  to  see  a  very  old  ruin,  the  oldest  castle 
built  in  the  coimtry  a.d.  1234  (I  believe  it  was), 
and  the  old  man  who  showed  it  had  fought  with 
Napoleon  in  the  Peninsula  and  against  him  at 
Waterloo.  I  gathered  some  flowers  off  the  walls, 
which  I  send  for  the  others  if  they  care.  It  is 
a  fine  view,  rather  Mounces-like  country,  be- 
yond; and  a  rather  pretty  walk  by  a  stream  all 
the  way;  it  is  three  miles  off. 


WIESBADEN  51 

To  the  same 

Wiesbaden, 
August  4,  1855. 

He'  and  I  walked  yesterday  to  the  most 
lovely  place  on  earth — a  sort  of  mixture  of  the 
prettiest  parts  of  Moimces  and  Capheaton,  the 
cave  of  the  Robber  Lutweis.  I  longed  for  you 
all  to  be  there,  especially  E.,  for  it  was  admir- 
ably robberish ;  the  old  brigand  lived  there  about 
the  middle  of  the  last  century.  He  had  good 
taste,  certainly.  The  way  thither  is  first  up 
a  steep  hill,  dotted  with  woods,  by  the  most 
dark  and  wild  of  rambling  paths  to  the  Lockene, 
a  sort  of  round  building  on  columns  whence  you 
see  the  most  of  the  Rhine  and  Moselle,  and  the 
further  country.  Then  you  strike  right  off 
thro'  the  forest  by  a  most  lovely  path,  and  go 
up  and  down  for  a  long  way  till  you  come  to  a 
sort  of  bank  or  wall  of  rocks,  up  which  you  get 
(for  they  are  not  bare  rocks,  except  here  and 
there  on  the  top,  the  sides  slope  down,  and  so 
are  very  accessible),  then  on  both  sides  the 
groimd  sinks  and  gives  you  the  loveliest  wood- 
scenery  view  that  ever  was  seen:  then  you 
descend  by  another  steep  winding  path  and  find 
a  road,  a  stream  with  natural  stepping-stones, 

'  His  uncle. 


52  LETTERS 

which  you  cross — reaching  a  steep  bank  on  the 
other  side,  and  there  is  a  most  beautiful  view  of 
rocks   which   contain   his   cave,    looking   most 
inaccessible;  just  almost  a  single  narrow  and 
long  platform,  which  might  easily  be  defended 
by   robbers   against   any   amount   of   soldiery; 
it  is  very  steep,  and  the  cave  and  rocks  so  hid- 
den by  an  outer  wall  of  trees  whose  branches 
protect  it,   that  one  might  pass  it  often  and 
never    discover    the    soldiers    lurking    behind; 
in  front  you  descend  by  a  steep  track,  paved 
with   red   slugs    (the   only  drawback   to   these 
woods),  to  a  long  meadow  stretching  far  away 
between  the  woods  which  rise  steeply  on  both 
sides.     Through  this  meadow  runs  the  stream 
which  supplies  the  robbers  in  their  high  rock, 
towering  above,  with  the  best  of  pure  spring 
water.     I  always  drink  some  when  I  pass,  it 
only  begins  a  little  higher  up,  and  there  are 
forests  of  wild  raspberries  and  red-berried  elders, 
with  which  latter  Uncle  T.  fell  in  love,  the  colour 
is  so  beautiful  at  a  little  distance,  and  we  are 
bringing  home   some   seeds.      We    thought    it 
would  look  lovely  about  East  Dene.    This  mead- 
ow continues   for  a  long  way,  then   the  woods 
.  .  .  and  for  miles  and  miles  you  see  nothing 
but  this  endless  forest,  high  up  two  rocks  and 


WIESBADEN  53 

mountains,  and,  perched  between  the  emi- 
nences, the  Duke's  hunting  seat  looks  down  on 
us  far  away.  It  was  a  bright  but  cool  day, 
and  too  delightful!  We  went  home  by  another 
way  which  took  us  into  an  opening  above  a 
steep  wooded  and  winding  valley,  giving  a 
beautiful  view  of  Mayence  and  the  neighbouring 
country.  All  the  forest  is  intersected  by  the 
most  exquisite  paths,  winding  up  and  down,  and 
is  full  of  so  many  beautiful  places  that  the  at- 
tempt to  describe  them  would  be  endless;  judge 
of  the  rest  by  what  you  have  heard,  imperfect 
and  faint  as  my  description  is.     In  the  evening  I 

went  out  again  with  Mr.  C and  had  another 

long  wood  ramble;  we  saw,  among  other  things, 
the  Weeping  Oak;  it  hangs  droopingly  like  a 
willow,  and  bears  no  fruit;  the  only  one  in  Ger- 
many, and  all  the  visitors  come  to  see  it. 


To  the  same 


Wiesbaden, 
August  12,  1855. 


To-morrow  early  we  start  to  sleep,  I  believe, 
at  Wurtzburg  and  next  day  at  Nuremberg, 
where  we  stay  three  or  four  days.  It  is  pleasant 
to  move  again  and  see  more  places,  but  for  some 
reasons  I  am  sorry  to  leave  Wiesbaden,  espe- 


54  LETTERS 

cially  the  Forest.  ...  I  went  to  Mayence 
yesterday  with  Uncle  T.'s  servant,  and  saw 
the  Cathedral;  a  fine  one,  but  not  to  be  seen 
after  Cologne.  There  are  some  fine  monu- 
ments,— one  that  of  S.  Boniface,  erect,  of  red- 
sandstones,  which  interested  me,  as  I  look  upon 
him  rather  as  ours,  being  the  patron  of  Bon- 
church.  Another  of  an  old  Crusader  (very 
famous  for  its  beauty)  had  the  loveliest  face  you 
can  think  of,  a  smiling  still  expression,  and  the 
figure  so  perfect  that  it  might  move  and  not 
surprise  one.  The  Cathedral  has  been  terribly 
battered  and  smashed  about  by  repeated  bom- 
bardments, and  little  of  the  old  part  is  left; 
but  what  there  is  they  say  is  older  almost  than 
any  other.  Also,  which  is  very  rare,  it  has  a 
high  Altar  and  Choir  at  each  end,  that  in  the 
west  (with  splendid  carvings  and  windows) 
is  used  on  Sundays,  the  E.  one  on  weekdays  only. 
The  cloisters  are  beautiful,  and  the  Chapter- 
house with  the  old  Archbishops*  tombs;  one, 
Bp.  Adalbert  I.,  was  seized  and  imprisoned  by 
the  Emperor:  whereon  his  loving  subjects  of 
Mayence  rose  and  seized  the  Emperor  and 
held  him  prisoner  till  they  got  back  their  Bishop 
safe  and  sound;  and  he  granted  the  citizens 
great  privileges,  to  reward  their  loyalty.  It  was 


WIESBADEN  55 

an  enormously  rich  diocese  and  the  Bps.  were 
very  powerful  I  believe.  In  the  cloisters  is  the 
original  monument  of  the  Minstrel  Frauenlob 
(Praisewomen)  so  named  for  his  courtesy;  all 
is  battered  away  but  the  head,  which  I  thought 
beautiful.  The  Bishop's  arms  are  emblazoned 
above  in  the  roof.  I  then  went  up  the  tower  to 
the  belfry ;  saw  the  city  and  view  of  the  country, 
with  the  junction  of  the  Rhine  and  Maine  below; 
and  then  up  a  ladder  above  the  belfry  into  the 
highest  point,  a  round  gallery  within  the  upper 
dome,  with  open-work  sides,  to  the  horror  and 
alarm  of  the  showman,  who  assured  me  that 
people  hardly  ever  went  up;  but  of  course  this 
determined  me  to  go,  and  I  did,  whereof  I  am 
rather  conceited,  especially  as  the  great  clock 
struck  four,  making  a  most  awful  noise  just 
as  I  was  halfway  up  the  ladder,  and  made  the 
whole  concern  shake  and  rattle.  The  view 
was  very  fine. 


[The  following  group  of  letters,  of  an  earlier 
period  than  the  rest,  are  taken  by  themselves, 
and  form  the  only  record  of  a  part  of  the  writer's 
life  at  Oxford,  and  his  conscientious  work,  for  a 
time,  at  the  legal  studies  which  proved  so  iriv- 


56  LETTERS 

some  and  contrary  to  the  real  bent  of  his  mind 
and  genius.] 


To  the  same 


Union, 
Nov.  [1859]. 


I  hope,  although  I  have  had  no  news  of  it, 
that  you  are  safely  settled  at  Pau:  I  hope  when 
you  have  time,  to  get  a  line  from  one  of  you. 
I  have  myself  been  rather  busy  since  I  last 
heard  from  A.  and  E.  at  Tours,  in  working 
(unhappily  too  late)  for  my  first  examination 
in  Classics — ^which  turns  out  a  failure.  I  had 
hoped  to  get  it  done,  and  have  my  way  clear 
to  work  for  honours  in  the  spring.  As  it  is,  I 
shall  have  them  both  on  my  hands  at  once,  and 
I  need  not  add,  feel  ashamed  of  myself.  In  my 
history  work  it  will  I  hope  make  no  difference; 
and  at  all  events  I  have  it  only  to  think  of  just 
now;  and  shall  be  able  to  go  at  it  in  peace. 
Being  here,  I  can  ask  the  "historical"  authorities 
how  to  set  at  it,  with  a  special  view  to  their 
requirements. 

There  is  no  other  Oxford  news  that  I  know  of, 
of  equal  importance  with  my  work,  prospects, 
etc.,  except  the  presence  of  a  Gracious  Prince 
of  Wales  and  the  rapturous  excitement  of  a 


OXFORD  57 

favoured  city.  He  comes  here  to  hear  the 
speeches  and  throws  the  President  of  the  Union 
into  a  feeble  but  happy  ecstasy:  filHng  also  the 
local  papers  with  marvellous  rumours  of  his 
dress,  dinner,  manners,  suite,  and  behaviour. 

To  the  same 

Nanestock, 
Ash  Wednesday,  i860. 

It  is  a  pity  that  all  the  law  they  make  us 
learn  is  mediaeval  and  obsolete  or  I  might  cut 

out  L. and  do  the  family  on  my  own  hook. 

By  the  by,  if  you  want  to  get  a  better  account 
of  the  whole  question  of  history  at  Oxford,  I 
recommend  you  to  get  an  article  by  a  great 
friend  of  Mr.  Stubbs,  published  in  No.  i  of  Bent- 
ley's  Quarterly  Review,  March  759.  I  have  just 
read  it  and  I  think  it  would  interest  you  if  you 
care  to  know  about  my  reading  and  chances. 

You  may  have  seen  in  the  Guardian  that 
there  is  a  prize  at  Oxford  of  £50  (I  think)  for  a 
poem  on  the  subject  of  Sir  John  Franklin  and 
the  late  discoveries.'  I  have  written  for  it 
and  shown  it  to  Mr.  Stubbs,  who  advises  it  to 
be  sent  in,  and  declares  it  ought  to  have  the 

'  This  poem  in  the  rough  MS.,  on  1 1  sheets  of  thin  foolscap, 
folded  and  addressed  for  postage  to  his  sister  Edith  dt  Pau  in  i860, 
is  now  in  my  possession.     (Ed.) 


58  LETTERS 

prize.  I  wish  it  may,  but  very  greatly  doubt. 
(Don't  suppose  I  gave  it  too  much  time:  it 
didn't  take  two  mornings'  work.)  As  there 
must  be  two  copies  (for  there  is  a  law  against 
sending  in  such  things  in  one's  handwriting  lest 
the  examiners  should  know  whose  the  poem  is 
before  the  prize  is  awarded),  I  will  send  you 
mine  as  soon  as  the  other  copy  is  made,  if  you 
would  like  to  see  it.  If  I  could  get  money  to 
publish  any  others,  or  some  of  them,  which  have 
been  very  successful  in  MS.  lately,  I  should  do 
myself  the  honour  of  reading  you  such  select 
passages  as  not  being  too  mediaeval  or  Shake- 
spearian are  not  disqualified  from  family  enter- 
tainment. I  shall  be  anxious  to  see  how  you 
like  the  one  mentioned  above. 


To  the  same 


Nanestock, 
March    ii,    i860. 


As  soon  as  I  can  get  my  verses  copied  you 
shall  have  them — with  much  gratitude  for  your 
generous  offer.  But  I  have  thought — or  rather 
Mr.  Stubbs  started  the  shining  idea — ^that  if  I 
send  you  one  copy  some  of  the  others  might 
copy  it  out  for  me — which  would  make  all  safe: 


OXFORD  59 

and  as  June  the  ist  is  the  day  for  sending  it, 
it  would  give  plenty  of  time. 

I  have  the  honour  to  announce  that  the  one 
really  awful  piece  of  work  before  me  is  now 
behind  me.  I  have  completed  my  analysis  of 
Blackstone's  law.  All  that  remains  is  by  com- 
parison to  the  hard  parts  of  that  work  as  pleas- 
ant reading  as  Dumas.  ...  As  to  my  Oxford 
sojourn,  I  can  tell  you  now.  About  a  week 
after  Easter  I  go  up.  If  all  is  well  I  shall  have 
to  stay  the  whole  term.  For  the  little  examina- 
tion is  at  the  beginning  and  the  great  one  at  the 
end.  .  .  . 


To  the  same 


Nanestock, 
April  15,  i860. 


I  am  so  busy  just  now  and  in  so  many  ways 
that  you  must  make  excuses  for  my  letters  if 
they  are  short  and  few.  This  week  probably 
I  return  to  Oxford:  when  there  I  will  tell  you 
how  to  direct  to  me. 

I  think,  thanks  mainly  to  Mr.  Stubbs'  help 
and  trouble,  I  may  expect  to  return  with  a 
good  piece  of  the  work  done  for  good.  As  I 
told  you  before,  the  hardest  technical  work  and 
such  as  would  be  difficult  to  do  alone  is  gone 


6o  LETTERS 

through.  An  American  book  on  International 
Laws  is  my  chief  enemy  just  now,  but  I  hope 
to  settle  him  in  a  few  days. 

.  .  .  When  I  have  done  with  routine  work  I 
think  of  taking  periods  to  read  in  contemporary 
books  if  I  can  keep  up  my  present  leaning  toward 
history.  I  got  out  (the  last  time  I  was  at 
Wallington)  all  sorts  of  things  about  Mary 
Stuart  of  the  most  exciting  kind,  down  to  an 
inventory  of  her  gowns,  which  gave  me  great 
satisfaction,  as  they  were  very  nice  colours, 
and  showed  she  had  an  eye  for  painting.  I  am 
in  the  meantime  taking  in  (at  Oxford)  either 
Charlemagne  or  St.  Louis — possibly  both.  That 
is  the  sort  of  history  I  like — live  biographical 
chronicle,  not  dead  constitutional  records  like 
the  respected  Hallam's,  over  whom  Mr.  Stubbs 
and  I  (neither  without  execrations)  have  been 
breaking  our  teeth  more  or  less  for  months.  .  .  . 


[The  following  letter  contains  an  account  of 
the  riding  accident  alluded  to  in  the  "recollec- 
tions."] 


OXFORD  6i 

To  the  same 

Oxford, 

June  5,  i860. 

I  got  your  letter  yesterday  and  was  very  glad 
to  hear  of  you  safe  in  London  after  all  the  rain, 
wind,  and  snow.  I  am  glad,  too,  that  now  you 
are  in  England  I  can  write  to  you  myself  word 
of  what  I  would  not  have  told  you  while  at  a 
distance.  About  the  beginning  of  last  week  I 
had  a  bad  fall  from  a  horse  in  leaping  a  gate. 
It  was  in  the  end  lucky  that  I  alighted  full  on 
my  chin  and  the  lower  part  of  my  face — but 
as  some  teeth  were  splintered,  the  jaw  sprained, 
and  the  lips  cut  up  it  was  not  pleasant.  For  a 
week  nearly  I  have  been  kept  in  bed  and  fed  on 
liquids,  and  still  I  can  eat  nothing  but  crumb 
of  bread  and  such  Hke.  But  I  am  up  to-day  and 
able  to  write,  and  quite  well  otherwise  (Jaws 
excepted)  only  of  course  not  very  strong.  The 
Dr.  did  last  week  prohibit  ideas  of  trying  to 
bring  my  ill-fated  work  through  to  some  end 
or  other  (certainly  the  Fates  are  against  my 
reading  for  honours  in  history),  but  I  must 
stay  a  day  or  two  longer  to  try.  If  I  really 
caimot  do  enough  to  get  fairly  through  and  take 
a   decent   place   in   the   list — then   of  course  I 


62  LETTERS 

shall  not  try  but  come  up  to  you  in  London 
this  week.  If  not  (that  is  if  I  do  go  in)  I  shall 
be  ten  days  or  a  fortnight  longer.  .  .  .  Mrs. 
Johnson  has  been  most  kind — calling  constantly 
to  ask  after  and  sit  with  me  during  the  past 
week:  I  persuaded  her  not  to  send  word  of  my 
accident  through — until  I  could  write  myself 
to  tell  you  there  was  no  danger  or  serious  hurt. 
(I  hope  even  the  cut  and  sprain  will  be  well 
when  I  see  you.)  I  thought  it  was  not  news 
to  meet  and  worry  you  at  second-hand  on  a 
first  arrival.  .  .  . 

[The  following  undated  but  much  later  letter 
refers  to  his  return  to  Oxford  as  a  visitor.] 

To  the  same 

Ball.  Coll., 

April  26th. 

As  Jowett  has  kindly  pressed  me  to  stay  till 
Monday  I  write  to  let  you  know  my  plans  and 
to  ask  you  if  (as  I  expect)  a  book  has  arrived 
for  me  from  Dulau's  (Victor  Hugo's  new  great 
poem,  which  I  wish  to  review  after  reading  and 
as  quickly  as  I  can)  to  be  good  enough  to  for- 
ward it  to  me  by  the  next  post,  though  I  am 
afraid  it  is  rather  bulky.     My  visit  has  been 


OXFORD  63 

wholly  pleasant,  but  that  through  too  much 
confidence  in  the  word  of  a  deceiving  porter  all 
my  luggage  was  left  at  Reading  till  the  Monday, 
and  I  had  twice  to  appear  in  the  evening  before 
a  Galaxy  of  Fashion,  Rank,  and  Talent  in  a 
morning  dress,  and  to  borrow  a  clean  shirt  of 
the  Master.  He  is  really  the  most  hospitable 
of  men;  when  I  said  this  morning  I  thought  it 
must  be  time  for  me  to  be  on  the  move,  he  told 
me  I  was  always  welcome  for  as  long  as  I  pleased 
to  stay,  and  must  pay  him  another  visit  at  the 
end  of  the  summer  term  .  .  . 

[The  following  letter  to  his  eldest  sister, 
dated  Dec.  31st,  was  written  in  1863,  during 
the  winter  spent  with  us  at  Northcourt.  It 
seems  the  only  one  extant  of  that  particular 
period.] 

Northcourt, 
December  31st. 

...  I  owe  you  thanks  for  more  letters  than 
one,  which  please  accept  in  full.  As  to  the 
pictures  on  3^our  projected  journey,  I  am  sorry 
to  say  I  know  nothing  of  Genoa,  as  I  was  only 
there  for  a  minute  under  violent  rain;  but  I 
believe  it  does  not  shine  in  galleries,  the  effects 
of  sea  and  history  being  its  strong  points.      It 


64  LETTERS 

certainly  lies  open  beautifully  to  the  salt  lake. 
But  at  Milan  you  will  have  enough  to  do.  ist, 
the  Ambrosian  Library,  where  there  is  a  Virgil 
illuminated  or  painted  in  small  by  Simone 
Menni  (?)  for  Petrarca;  also  the  lock  of  hair 
and  autograph  letters  of  Madonna  Lucrezia 
Estense  Borgia:  which  please  salute  respectfully 
for  me.  2d  (or  ist  if  you  prefer),  the  Brera. 
At  the  end  of  one  of  the  smaller  rooms  there  is 
a  pictiire  for  which  I  would  give  the  eyes  out  of 
my  head  if  I  could  see  it  without  them:  a  feast 
in  the  open  air,  with  music,  men  and  women 
being  played  to:  by  Bonifazio:  one  of  the  most 
perfect  pictures  I  know  of  any  Venetian  painter. 
In  one  comer — that  you  may  recognize  it  the 
sooner — there  are  two  pages  standing — a  white 
boy  tickling  a  black  one  who  tries  not  to  laugh. 
The  Raffaelle  is  one  of  those  moist  and  sugary 
pictures  which  do  not  attract  me;  but  you  will 
have  to  look  at  it.  Some  Crivellis,  too,  though 
imequal  and  not  lovely,  are  worth  looking  over. 
Look  also  at  some  three  or  foiu*  small  narrow 
pictures  in  the  corners  (unless  changed)  of  the 
further  large  room  on  the  left  as  you  enter  by 
the  Luini  gallery;  single  figures  of  saints  stand- 
ing separately  in  little  meadows  full  of  wild 
flowers,  by  Gentile  da  Fabriano;  very  plain  and 


MILAN  65 

quaint,  as  people  call  it,  but  with  great  simple 
beauty  in  them,  unless  my  recollection  flatters 
them:  the  foregrounds  in  flower,  especially. 
Look,  too,  at  Gentile  Bellini's  6"^.  Mark  Preaching 
at  Alexandria.  One  or  two  small  Carpaccios 
are  worth  looking  up;  but  that  great  and  deli- 
cious painter  is  only  to  be  seen  fairly  in  the 
Venice  Academy;  though  he  has  one  very  lovely 
large  picture  at  Brescia,  in  the  same  gallery 
with  a  grand  portrait  by  Moroni.  (These  and 
Titian's  St.  Afra  are  the  main  things  to  see  at 
Brescia  if  you  stop  at  that  city,  which  on  this 
account  it  is  worth  while  to  do.)  I  don't  remind 
you  that  the  supreme  crown  and  glory  of  Milan 
is  Leonardo's  Last  Supper,  in  spite  of  much 
battering  of  French  shots  and  of  Austrian 
stabling.  To  it  of  course  you  will  be  carried 
off  at  once;  and  you  will  not  need  to  be  told  to 
look  out  for  Luini's,  as  you  will  see  nothing  else 
in  the  Brera  to  speak  of  till  you  are  through 
no  end  of  rooms  and  galleries.  These  are  the 
chief  things  I  remember  on  the  Italian  side  of 
the  frontier.  If  I  were  with  you  I  should  re- 
member many  more.  If  you  get  to  Milan  you 
ought  not  to  be  able  to  resist  crossing  the 
border  to  Verona,   Padua,  and  Venice,  taking 

in  Vicenze.     There  is  matter  in  all  these  names 
5 


66  LETTERS 

for  a  dozen  letters.  At  Verona,  mind  you  do 
San  Zenone  thoroughly;  and  as  the  Austrians 
won't  give  you  access  to  the  great  bridge  look 
at  it  from  thence  as  you  leave  the  church;  and 
go  into  the  crypts,  for  San  Z.  is  great  in  stone 
and  metal  work.  In  the  extreme  crypt  there  is 
a  Crucifixion  in  stone,  which  is  exactly  like  an 
Egyptian  work;  just  the  cut  of  beard  and  turn 
of  feature  of  our  Egyptian  relics  at  the  Museimi. 
I  mean,  of  course,  the  human  monuments,  or 
busts,  not  the  dog-headed  gods.  Examine  all 
you  can  of  the  groups  on  the  great  metal  gates, 
which  are  splendid  if  you  make  out  the  Old 
Testament  subjects,  or  even  if  you  don't.  Also 
the  monuments  of  the  Scalas,  Dante's  Can 
Grande  among  the  lot,  which  are  too  beautiful 
for  any  other  city.  These  must  be  hints  enough 
to  start  with,  if  you  want  to  see  what  I  saw  and 
remember  with  most  liking;  which  I  hope  you 
will  do.  I  write  as  much  as  possible  what  you 
ask  for,  both  on  that  accoimt  and  because  I 
have  not  much  other  material  for  a  letter  in 
any   degree   worth   writing   or   receiving.     My 

greatest   pleasure   just    now   is   when    M ' 

practises  Handel  on  the  organ;  but  I  can  hardly 
behave  for  delight  at  some  of  the  choruses.     I 

'  The  editor. 


MILAN  67 

care  hardly  more  than  I  ever  did  for  any  minor 
music;  but  that  is  an  enjoyment  which  wants 
special  language  to  describe  it,  being  so  unlike 
all  others.  It  crams  and  crowds  me  with  old 
and  new  verses,  half -remembered  and  half- 
made,  which  new  ones  will  hardly  come  straight 
afterwards;  but  under  their  influence  I  have 
done  some  more  of  my  Atalanta  which  will  be 
among  my  great  doings  if  it  keeps  up  with  its 
own  last  scenes  throughout. 

I  repay  M to  the  best  of  my  ability  but 

cheaply,  by  blundering  over  Greek  verbs  with 
her.  She  keeps  her  energy  fresh  by  her  versatil- 
ity. I  wish  you  were  here,  and  as  quiet  as  I 
have  happily  been  all  this  time,  thanks  to  their 
kindness,  instead  of  being  pestered  by  strangers 
on  a  foreign  coast — and  that  the  frowzy  coast 
of  a  blue  pond.'  We  saw  the  re-launch  of  a 
lifeboat  the  other  day,  but  as  the  sea  was  smooth 
it  was  only  a  pretty  sight,  not  an  excitement. 
I  walked  once  over  to  the  end  of  the  downs 
above  Freshwater  Gate:  it  is  the  finest  scenery 
of  sea-downs  I  ever  saw,  and  all  Mottistone 
and  Aft  on  Downs  were  new  to  me. 

'  The  Mediterranean — for  which  and  its  coast  resorts  he  always 
cherished  an  undisguised  contempt  and  dislike.     (Ed.) 


68  LETTERS 

To  his  Mother 

TuMMiL  BRrocE,  Pitlochry,  N.  B., 
[Early  'seventies]  July  24th. 

...  I  certainly  am,  and  Jowett  has  remarked 
it  to  me,  very  much  stronger  and  up  to  far  more 
walking  and  climbing  work  than  I  was  last 
year.  We  made  a  party  last  Sunday  week  to 
the  top  of  Schehallion,  the  highest  mountain 
in  this  part  of  the  Highlands ;  and  I  have  to-day 
discovered  a  plan  of  bathing  in  two  parts  of  the 
same  stream  at  once  which  is  very  comforting  ; 
we  go  into  the  pool  below  one  waterfall,  swim 
up  to  the  foot  of  it,  and  climb  up  the  rocks  it 
falls  over,  as  there  is  plenty  of  room  and  foot- 
hold by  the  side  of  the  torrent,  and  then  plunge 
again  into  the  pool  above  this  and  below  a  higher 
waterfall — returning  finally  of  course  down  the 
rocks  we  came  up  and  so  into  the  lower  pool 
again  and  out  on  the  other  side.  The  upper 
pool  where  we  have  been  bathing  regularly 
(weather  permitting)  for  days  past  is  a  most 
lovely  basin  of  sheer  rock,  safely  accessible  by 
descent  in  one  place  only;  when  you  jump  in 
at  the  foot  of  the  fall  the  impulse  of  the  water 
is  so  strong  that  it  sends  you  spinning  right 
across  the  pool,  and  it  is  all  one  can  possibly 


PITLOCHRY  WITH  DR.  JOWETT  69 

do  to  swim  back  to  the  other  side,  though  but 
two  or  three  strokes  off.  It  is  really  hot  here 
on  some  days — to-day  for  instance — though  of 
course  fitful  as  to  rain  and  sunshine.  The 
great  thunderstorms  (as  you  perhaps  know) 
have  done  awful  damage  in  various  parts  of 
England,  the  country  about  Manchester  espe- 
cially, as  I  see  in  the  county  papers.  It  is  a 
strange  exceptional  summer  everywhere;  you 
may  have  seen  that  the  deaths  in  New  York 
from  sunstroke  and  other  causes  immediately 
brought  on  by  the  heat  are  counted  by  himdreds 
within  the  last  few  weeks.  ...  I  have  nothing 
more  to  tell  you,  except  of  a  very  flattering 
petition  conveyed  to  me  in  pressing  terms  from 
the  conductors  of  a  French  journal  for  a  poem 
(French  of  course),  from  my  hand.  As  I  like 
being  recognized  as  a  French  poet  as  well  as  an 
English,  I  am  writing  them  one  on  some  music 
of  Wagner's — I  hope  they  won't  mind  the  musi- 
cian being  a  German.  I  hate  them  otherwise, 
but  I  must  say  the  one  good  thing  the  Germans 
can  do — music — they  do  so  much  better  than 
any  other  people  that  no  one  even  comes  second. 
Jowett  talks  of  going  to  some  part  of  Germany 
— I  think  Bavaria  or  some  southern  province 
— ^when  we  break  up;  but  that  I  think  will  not 


70  LETTERS 

be  for  some  weeks.  He  would  not  go  last  year 
having  too  much  good  feeling  to  wish  or  to  en- 
dtire  to  be  the  witness  of  their  rampant  exulta- 
tion over  the  plunder  of  France,  and  robbing 
of  her  provinces:  which  I  like  in  him  particu- 
larly, as  his  tendencies  and  connections  are  the 
reverse  of  mine,  being  much  more  in  the  German 
line  than  the  French.  .  .  . 

To  Ms  Mother 

The  Pines,  Putney  Hill,  S.  W., 
November  26,  1882. 


My  dearest  M , 

On  Friday  morning  Watts  and  I  arrived  about 
7  or  8  o'clock  from  Paris,  after  five  days'  stay 
— ^five  of  the  most  rememberable  days  of  my  life. 

On  Monday  (as  you  may  have  seen  in  the 
Times)  I  was  invited  to  dinner  at  Victor  Hugo's 
and  accordingly  presented  myself  in  a  state  of 
pertiu*bation  as  well  as  delight  before  the  great- 
est— I  know — and  I  believe  the  best,  man  now 
living.  No  words  can  express  his  kindness  of 
manner,  as  he  said  on  taking  my  hand,  "  Je  suis 
heureux  de  vous  serrer  la  main  comme  k  mon 
fils."  I  am  delighted  to  say  that  he  is  even  more 
wonderful — all  things  considered — for  his  age 
than  Mrs.  Procter  for  hers.     He  will  be  eighty- 


VICTOR  HUGO  71 

one  in  February,  and  walked  upright  and  firm 
without  a  stick.  His  white  hair  is  as  thick  as 
his  dark  eyebrows,  and  his  eyes  are  as  bright 
and  clear  as  a  little  child's.  After  dinner,  he 
drank  my  health  with  a  little  speech,  of  which 
— tho'  I  sat  just  opposite  him — my  accursed 
deafness  prevented  my  hearing  a  single  word. 
This,  however,  was  the  only  drawback — tho* 
certainly  a  considerable  one — to  my  pleasure.  ^^^  ^,. 
On  Wednesday  evening  I  went  with  Watts  '"x 
to  the  places  in  the  stalls  of  the  Theatre  Frangais 
provided  for  us  by  the  great  kindness  of  my 
friend  and  correspondent  for  a  good  many  years 
now,  Auguste  Vacquerie,  the  chief  editor  of 
the  Rappel,  and  all  but  a  son  to  Victor  Hugo. 
It  was,  as  you  probably  know,  the  second  night 
of  the  representation,  on  a  Parisian  stage,  of  a 
play  which  had  been  first  acted  on  the  same  day 
fifty  years  before,  and  suppressed  the  next  day 
by  Louis  Philippe's  government,  on  account  of 
a  supposed  allusion,  in  a  single  line,  to  the 
infamy  of  Citizen  Philippe  Egalite,  that  worthy 
monarch's  worthy  parent.  This  time  Le  Roi 
s  amuse — which  Watts  thinks  Hugo's  greatest 
work,  second  only  to  Shakespeare's  King  Lear 
in  all  the  world  of  tragic  poetry  with  which  it 
can   rightly   be   compared — was   on   the   whole 


72  LETTERS 

nobly  acted  and  worthily  received.  I  was 
invited  between  the  3d  and  4th  acts  into  the 
author's  box,  where  I  found  him  sitting  in  state, 
and  in  reply  to  his  question,  "Etes  vous  content?" 
said  I  most  certainly  was,  and  ventured  to  ask 
if  he  did  not  approve  of  the  chief  actor.  Got, 
in  the  part  of  Triboulet,  which  is  supposed  to 
be  the  most  trying  and  overwhelming  for  an 
actor  that  ever  was  written  (I  should  have 
thought  Lear  as  bad,  but  Watts  thinks  the 
strain  on  the  part  of  Triboulet  must  be  even 
greater ithan  that  of  Lear;  and  he  knows  far 
more  of  the  stage  than  I  do).  Hugo  replied 
that  he  did;  and  indeed  it  was  generally  very 
fine,  as  far  as  a  deaf  wretch  can  judge.  There 
was  not  quite  such  a  prolonged  thunder  of 
applause  at  the  end  as  I  expected;  but  Watts 
thinks  this  was  merely  due  to  the  overpowering 
effect  of  the  close,  which  is  certainly  the  most 
terrible  as  well  as  pathetic  catastrophe  in  any 
play  except  (again  and  of  course)  King  Lear. 

I  have  also  made  acquaintance  with  the 
translatress  of  my  Ode  on  the  Statue  of  Victor 
Hugo  and  her  husband,  and  (not  least)  their 
little  girl.  .  .  .  She  is  the  sweetest  and  bright- 
est little  person  now  going,  and  all  the  admira- 
tion lavished  by  one  of  the  most  brilliant  circles 


VICTOR  HUGO  73 

in  Paris  on  her  beauty  and  cleverness  has  not 
— as  far  as  I  can  see — made  her  in  the  least  vain 
or  affected.  Her  mamma  is  a  princess  by  birth 
and  (as  of  coiirse  you  will  have  anticipated)  a 
Nihilist:  a  Russian.  .  .  .  She  talks  English 
as  well  as  I  do,  and  French  as  well  as  our  com- 
mon master  Victor  Hugo  does.  And  she  has 
a  very  pretty  and  pleasant  house  in  the  subtirbs 
of  Paris,  with  a  splendid  stud  of  horses,  which 
she  took  me  to  see — among  others,  a  most  lovely 
Arabian,  and  a  splendid  Russian,  the  strongest- 
looking  horse  I  ever  saw,  which  I  can  quite 
believe  will  (as  its  mistress  says)  go  anywhere 
and  hold  out  for  any  time.  Also,  there  was 
Dora's  pony,  which  I  have  been  describing  to 
Bertie  as  eloquently  as  I  can.  Perhaps  I  need 
not  add  that  Dora's  mother  is  much  taken  with 
my  poems  on  Bertie,  some  of  which  she  has  been 
so  good  as  to  translate  to  Victor  Hugo,  who 
has  honoured  them  with  his  approbation — 
which,  next  to  your  liking  them,  is  the  most 
delightful  tribute  as  well  as  the  greatest  honour 
that  any  work  of  mine  ever  received. 

And  now  I  will  end  this  very  egotistic  letter, 
hoping  it  may  find  you  all  as  well  as  it  leaves  me, 
and  remain  with  best  love. 

Ever  your  most  affectionate  son. 


74  LETTERS 

To  the  same 

June  17,  1883. 

I  am  half  out  of  my  mind  with  gratitude  and 
excitement  at  Victor  Hugo's  latest  act  of  kind- 
ness in  sending  me  his  new  book — the  third 
and  last  part  of  a  series  of  poems,  the  first  part 
of  which  I  began  reading  at  East  Dene  in  the 
summer  vacation  of  1859 — twenty-four  years 
ago — ^when  it  was  just  out — little  dreaming  I 
should  live  to  earn  the  honour  of  receiving  the 
last  instalment  of  his  greatest  work  (as  I  think 
it)  from  the  hands  of  the  greatest  poet  of  the 
century.  Certainly  I  have  been  very  fortunate 
in  the  kindness  I  have  always  received  from  the 
great  men  who  were  the  objects  of  my  earliest 
reverence  and  enthusiasm  as  soon  as  I  was  old 
enough  to  have  any  belief  or  opinion  of  my  own 
as  to  great  men  and  their  works. 

To  the  same 

Jan.  25,  1884. 

...  I  have  finished  my  verses  on  the  great 
sunsets,  but  not  the  poem  of  which  they  are 
to  form  part — addressed  to  Victor  Hugo  on  the 
opening  of  this  year  (his  eighty-third — he  will 
be  eighty-two  this  month)  and  on  the  still  in- 


VICTOR  HUGO  75 

creasing  glories  and  varying  beauties  of  his  work, 
which  if  possible  grows  more  splendid  and  won- 
derful as  the  sunset  draws  nearer — tho'  from  all 
one  sees  or  hears  one  may  really  hope  he  has 
years  of  work  and  enjoyment  still  before  him 
among  his  friends  and  grandchildren.  Of  course 
you  see  the  allegory  that  was  at  once  suggested 
to  me  on  looking  at  that  glorious  transfiguration 
of  the  sky  a  little  before  the  sun  set,  which  made 
everything  above  and  around  more  splendid 
than  ever  it  was  at  morning  or  at  noon. 

I  hope  you  will  not  be  really  wearied  by  so 
long  a  letter — but  I  had  (and  have)  two  to 
thank  you  for,  and  to  write  to  you  is  only  less 
a  pleasure  than  to  get  and  read  your  letters — 
and  I  can  truly  say  I  have  no  greater  pleasure 
than  that. 

To  the  same 

May  21,  1885. 

I  cannot  thank  you  enough  or  in  such  words 
as  I  ought  for  your  kindness  and  sympathy  with 
me  in  this  great  sorrow.  Of  course  I  should 
have  been  very  unhappy  at  the  news  of  the 
impending  loss  of  the  greatest  man  of  our  cen- 
tury and  one  of  the  best  men  of  all  centuries, 
even  if  I  had  had  no  personal  cause  for  that 


76  LETTERS 

regret  which  I  know  he  would  not  wish  any  of 
us,  who  love  and  revere  him  to  feel,  because  I 
know  that  he  has — not  exactly  wished  for  death, 
but  felt  so  ready  and  all  but  wishful  to  be  re- 
leased from  trouble,  for  a  good  while,  that  one 
ought  hardly  to  grudge  it  him,  after  so  many 
years  of  self-sacrifice:  but  his  fatherly  kindness 
to  me  personally — his  goodness  in  accepting 
the  tribute  of  my  gratitude  and  admiration, 
and  requiting  it  with  such  cordial  and  affec- 
tionate words  both  written  and  spoken — can- 
not but  make  me  feel  this  great  loss  more  than 
a  stranger  perhaps  could — I  say  perhaps,  be- 
cause his  life  has  been  so  spent  in  doing  good 
deeds  as  well  as  producing  great  works  that  one 
must  not  pretend  to  guess  how  much  the  poor 
people  who  only  know  him  as  their  best  friend, 
and  not  as  the  greatest  poet  in  the  world,  may 
feel.  I  am  so  glad  that  he  has  had  the  pleasure 
of  knowing  how  they  love  him  (did  you  see  the 
telegram  that  said  he  had  been  so  pleased  to 
hear  how  anxiously  they  were  waiting  for  a  word 
of  news  of  him,  and  sent  them  a  message  of 
thanks?),  and  I  do  think  it  does  the  greatest 
possible  honour  to  Paris  and  to  France  that  there 
should  be  this  great  deep  universal  feeling  on 
such   an   occasion.     I    am   afraid    the   English 


VICTOR  HUGO  77 

would  not  feel  or  show  the  same  or  anything 
like  the  same  emotion  of  gratitude  and  love  and 
reverence  for  their  greatest  man.  To  be  sure, 
we  have  never  had  anybody  who  was  like 
Shakespeare  and  Milton  and  like  Wilberforce 
or  Howard  all  at  once.  When  I  think  of  his 
greatness  as  a  poet  and  his  goodness  as  a  man 
combined,  I  really  think  sometimes  that  there 
never  was  or  will  be  anybody  like  Victor  Hugo. 

My  good  and  kind  friend  Madame  Dorian 
has  sent  me  telegrams  of  the  worse  or  better 
symptoms — the  last  was  a  little  more  hopeful 
than  the  one  before;  but  I  am  not  going  to  let 
myself  hope  too  much.  The  day  before  yester- 
day, I  was  so  unhappy  that  I  could  do  nothing 
but  walk  and  think — but  that  always  does  me 
good.  I  can  not  stay  indoors  and  be  resigned 
or  distract  my  thoughts,  but  after  a  quick  walk 
I  do  always  feel  more  able  to  bear  whatever 
has  to  be  borne. 

I  send  you  my  new  book,  and  am  sending  a 
copy  also  to  Aunt  M.  by  this  post — but  it  does 
seem  rather  trivial,  when  the  greatest  of  all 
poets  since  Shakespeare  is  passing  away,  to 
think  of  one's  own  little  bits  of  work.  However, 
I  hope  you  and  sisters  will  accept  it  as  the  best 
I  have  to  give.     I  want  you  to  like  the  Hymns 


78  LETTERS 

when  I  come  and  construe  them  to  you;  they 
are  modelled  after  the  patterns  in  Archbishop 
Trench's  Sacred  Latin  Poetry,  and  I  had  been 
(vainly,  in  both  senses  of  the  word  "vain") 
flattering  myself  that  Victor  Hugo  might  like 
them:  you  know  that  before  I  was  bom  he  had 
begun  writing  in  defence  of  the  old  cathedrals 
and  churches  that  were  being  "restored"  and 
demolished,  and  reviving  interest  in  sacred 
mediaeval  poetry  when  the  fashion  was  to  think 
it  as  barbarous  and  absurd  as  his  early  friend  M. 
de  Lamartine  thought  Dante. 

To  the  same 

May  25,  1885. 

I  don't  think  you  know  by  experience — as 
other  people  do — what  the  selfishness  of  great 
grief  is  with  the  run  of  men,  like  me,  who  cannot 
(hardly)  think  for  five  minutes  together  of  any- 
thing that  I  ought  to  think  of  just  yet.  I 
thought  I  knew  how  much  I  loved  as  well  as 
honoured  the  greatest  man  of  our  time,  but  I 
find  I  did  not.  He  was  so  very  kind  to  me — 
so  fatherly — that  nobody  can  quite  understand 
all  I  feel;  and  I  have  not  yet  been  able  to  get 
quite  clear  of  the  first  stupid  and  bewildered 
sense  of  bereavement.    And  he  looked  when  I 


VICTOR  HUGO  79 

saw  him  fully  as  robust  and  upright  as  Aunt  J. — 
who  is  seven  years  his  elder — and  I  did  think  we 
might  hope  to  have  him  with  us  till  he  reached 
at  least  her  present  age.  Those  who  knew  him 
best  and  longest  say  that  his  goodness  was  even 
greater  than  his  genius.  I  don't  see  how  that 
could  be  possible,  even  for  an  angel;  but  I  do 
believe  it  was  as  great. 

When  I  think  of  his  intense  earnestness  of 
faith  in  a  future  life  and  a  better  world  than  this, 
and  remember  how  fervently  Mazzini  always 
urged  upon  all  who  loved  him  the  necessity  of 
that  belief  and  the  certainty  of  its  actual  truth, 
I  feel  very  deeply  that  they  must  have  been 
right — or  at  least  that  they  shoiild  have  been — 
however  deep  and  difficult  the  mystery  which 
was  so  clear  and  transparent  to  their  inspired 
and  exalted  minds  may  seem  to  such  as  mine. 
They  ought  to  have  known,  if  any  man  ever 
did:  and  if  they  were  right,  I,  whose  love  and 
devotion  they  requited  with  such  kindness  as 
I  never  could  have  really  deserved,  shall  (some- 
how) see  them  again. 

I  should  very  much  like  to  come  down  straight 
to  you.  ,  .  .  I  know  how  good  you  would  all 
be  to  me  in  my  deep  sorrow — but  I  think  I  had 
better  deny  myself  that  comfort  for  this  reason. 


80  LETTERS 

I  am  writing,  or  trying  to  write,  an  account  of 
Victor  Hugo's  complete  works — just  simply  a 
list  of  the  labours  of  his  life,  with  some  slight 
attempt  at  a  description  or  definition  (or  indica- 
tion at  least)  of  each  (every  phrase  I  can  think 
of  seems  too  presimiptuous  and  pretentious, 
but  I  hope  you  will  understand  what  I  mean  to 
try  and  do) ;  and  if  I  can  manage,  which  (please 
heaven)  I  will  if  hard  work  can  do  it,  I  have 
promised  to  get  it  ready  for  the  July  number  of 
the  Nineteenth  Century.  It  is  all  I  can  do  (not 
for  him,  who  wants  nothing  that  man  can  do, 
and  never  could  have  wanted  anything  that  / 
could,  though  he  was  so  very  good  and  generous 
in  his  acknowledgment  of  my  attempts  to  ex- 
press my  thankfulness  to  him);  but  perhaps  it 
may  be  of  some  use  to  others,  and  possibly 
of  some  gratification  to  his  friends  and  mine: 
and  I  cannot  well  do  this  without  having  all 
his  books  (upwards  of  forty  volumes)  at  hand 
for  reference,  and  above  all  without  having  Watts 
at  hand  to  give  me  his  opinion  on  every  little 
bit  of  the  essay,  paragraph  by  paragraph,  as 
I  get  on  with  it;  for  of  course  I  want  it  to  be 
as  good  in  style  and  as  complete  in  record  as  I 
can  possibly  make  it ;  and  equally  of  course  when 
I  am  writing  on  a  subject  which  lies  so  near  my 


VICTOR  HUGO  8i 

heart  I  want  a  friend,  who  can  criticize  and  sym- 
pathize at  once,  to  tell  me  if  I  am  keeping  in 
the  right  line  or  not.  It  is  so  difficult  to  be 
sure  of  one's  phrases,  as  to  good  tone  and  good 
taste,  when  one  is  writing  for  the  public  about 
anything  which  touches  one's  deepest  feelings. 

If  I  had  time  I  would  write  to  thank  A.  and 
A.  [his  sisters]  for  their  letters,  which — like  yours, 
and  one  from  Aunt  M. — have  given  me  as 
much  pleasure  as  anything  can  just  now.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

June  i8,  1885. 

It  seems  very  ungrateful  to  have  been  a  whole 
fortnight  in  answering  so  precious  a  letter  as 
your  last;  but  for  three  weeks  I  have  done  no 
writing  but  on  one  subject,  and  on  that  I  have 
been  at  work  morning,  noon,  and  night,  I  may 
almost  say,  without  going  out  of  the  house: 
and  by  these  means  I  have  just  managed  to 
finish  in  time  for  the  July  number  of  the  Nine- 
tec?ith  Century  an  article  on  ''The  Work  of  Victor 
Hugo,"  nearer  70  than  60  fcap.  pages  in  length, 
and  giving  some  account  of  45  volumes  which 
had  to  be  consulted  or  referred  to,  studied  or 
restudied,  for  the  purpose.  Watts,  I  may  per- 
haps be  allowed  to  say,  thinks  very  highly  of  it 


82  LETTERS 

as  a  compendious  and  complete  account  of  the 
work  done  in  literature  during  upwards  of  70 
years  by  the  greatest  writer  of  the  age.  His 
first  book  was  written  at  sixteen,  and  his  last 
appeared  about  eighteen  months  ago.  I  have — 
as  you  will  see — ^given  at  least  a  word  of  notice 
to  everything,  so  that  a  careful  reader  of  my 
article  will  know  thoroughly  and  exactly  (as 
far  as  is  possible  considering  the  limits  of  an 
article)  the  character  and  the  date  of  each  suc- 
cessive publication  of  its  kind. 

As  to  the  pomp  and  publicity  of  the  funeral 
ceremonies,  it  must  be  remembered  that  he  was 
not  only  the  greatest  writer  of  his  century,  and 
of  his  country  in  any  century  (like  Dante  or 
Shakespeare),  but  also  a  great  patriot,  a  public 
servant  of  the  highest  distinction,  who  had 
devoted  and  hazarded  his  life  for  the  service  of 
his  country,  who  had  suffered  exile  for  upwards 
of  twenty  years,  and  the  loss  of  every  single  thing 
he  had  in  the  world  (he  went  into  banishment 
with  only  a  few  pounds  left  for  the  support  of 
his  whole  family)  on  account  of  his  loyalty  and 
fidelity.  I  think  therefore  that  though  he 
might  have  preferred  (as  I  should)  the  quiet 
place  of  rest  he  had  originally  ( I  believe)  chosen 
for  himself  at  Villequier  in  Normandy  beside 


VICTOR  HUGO  83 

his  wife  and  daughter,  it  is  much  to  the  credit 
of  his  countrymen  that  they  should  have  insisted 
on  paying  him  all  possible  honour  that  a  nation 
can  pay  to  its  greatest  man,  and  that  the  value 
and  importance  of  the  ceremony  as  a  proof  and 
evidence  of  natural  gratitude — never  better 
deserved — must  be  allowed  to  outweigh  every 
counter  consideration  of  possible  private  or  per- 
sonal preference. 

To  the  same 

February  23,  1891. 

I  am  glad  that  Mile.  Hugo's  marriage  has 
given  me  an  opportimity  of  talking  with  you 
on  a  matter  of  so  much  interest  as  that  about 
which  you  write.  So  far  from  being  an  "un- 
believer," if  you  mean  by  that  a  materialist 
who  is  convinced  that  there  is  no  future  life,  or  an 
infidel,  .  .  .  Victor  Hugo  was  so  passionate 
and  fervent  a  believer  in  a  future  life  and  a 
judgment  to  come  that  many  good  men  who 
could  not  share  his  conviction  regarded  him, 
even  to  the  last,  as  a  fanatic  or  religious  dreamer. 
"C'est  mal  de  ne  pas  croire  a  mon  Paradis, " 
he  said  once  to  some  friends  who  were  arguing 
against  his  faith  in  a  better  world,  "mais  vous 
verrezy    (I  may  add  here  that  Mazzini  was  so 


84  LETTERS 

deeply  and  intensely  possessed  by  the  same 
faith  that  the  only  people  I  ever  thought  him  the 
least  little  bit  hard  upon  were  atheists  and  materi- 
alists, who,  however  wrong  or  stupid  they  may 
be,  are  sometimes — of  course — as  good  and 
honest  and  unselfish  as  others.) 

To  his  Sisters 

April  5,  1897. 

.  .  .  Walter  has  given  me  {in  a  birthday 
present)  a  magnificent  photograph  (beautifully 
framed)  of  Victor  Hugo — taken  standing  on  a 
lovely  cliff  in  Guernsey,  and  in  a  lovely  high 
wind  which  must  have  made  the  snapshot  a 
miracle  of  luck  and  skill.  It  is  a  superb  likeness 
— you  can  almost  see  the  living  light  of  his 
wonderful  eyes. 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

July  6,  1900. 

Walter  is  very  well  again,  but  very  busy; 
as  am  I  also,  being  engaged  on  a  (?)  short  critical 
memoir  of  Victor  Hugo  (for  a  biographical 
dictionary)  which  must  get  itself  finished  by  the 
end  of  this  month.  It  is  not  a  light  task  to 
undertake  the  record  of  a  life  of  eighty-three 
years  and  a  series  of  books  that  fill  two  great 


VICTOR  HUGO  85 

long   shelves,    without   overlooking   any   point 
that  ought  not  to  be  missed.  .  .  . 

To  his  Youngest  Sister 

Ap.    24,    '83. 

...  In  reading  Autumn  and  Winter  you  will 
remember  that  my  poor  dear  friend  George 
Powell,  the  most  unselfish,  generous,  gentle  and 
kind  and  affectionate  of  men,  died  last  year  just 
about  three  months  before  Wagner — the  man 
who  was  to  him  what  Victor  Hugo  is  to  me.  As 
soon  as  I  heard  of  the  latter's  death,  the  fancy 
crossed  me  that  poor  George  had  gone  before 
to  announce  his  coming — one  of  the  fancies  that 
cross  one's  mind  even  when  the  heart  is  really 
and  deeply  moved — at  least  it  is  so  with  me. 


To  his  Mother 


July  6th. 
[Year  undated.] 


.  .  .  Please  give  him  [his  brother]  my  love 
and  best  wishes  on  the  14th  for  many  most 
happy  returns  of  his  birthday.  It  was  so  very 
funny  and  (if  I  may  say  so)  capricious  of  you  to 
go  and  choose  the  great  Republican  festival,  or 
birthday  of  the  French  Revolution — the  anni- 
versary of  the  fall  of  the  Bastille,  always  kept 


86  LETTERS 

by  nous  autres  as  a  feast-day  all  the  world  over 
— la  grande  date,  as  Victor  Hugo  himself  once 
wrote  after  it  at  the  top  of  a  letter  to  me  dated 
on  that  day — to  choose  it  as  the  birthday  of 
one  of  your  two  sons,  and  that  one  not  me!  I 
really  do  think  it  very  odd  and  hardly  right. 
We  must  have  changed  days  somehow.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

July  14th 
[No  year  given,  probably  'sixties.] 

When   you   come   here,    I    have   got   Victor 
Hugo's  last  book  for  you  to  read;  I  finished  it 

last  week  and [his  father]  is  going  to  begin 

it.  There  never  was  such  a  picture  of  little 
children  done  in  words,  before ;  and  no  one  but 
the  greatest  poet  of  a  great  age  could  have 
thought  of  anything  so  beautiful  as  carrying  the 
three  babies  who  are  the  centre  of  the  interest 
safe  through  all  the  terrors  of  civil  war  and 
revolution,  like  a  line  of  sunlight  through  all 
the  storm  and  shadow  of  the  story.  The  heroine 
...  is  a  lady  of  18  months  old  at  the  beginning 
of  the  book,  and  20  months  at  the  end  when  she 
is  left  in  her  mother's  arms  safe  after  various 
adventures.  There  is  a  description  of  her 
waking  at  sunrise  and  looking  at  her  little  feet 


MISS    ALICE    SWINBURNE 


MAZZINI  87 

in  a  ray  of  sunlight  and  talking  to  them,  which 
is  enough  to  make  one  cry  with  delight. 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

April   10,  '67. 

Your  letter,  if  late,  was  all  the  more  welcome 

,  .  .  Please  thank [his  mother]  very  much 

for  her  letter  and  reassure  her  concerning  my 
Chief'  and  myself;  he  is  not  at  all  likely  to 
despatch  me  on  a  deadly  errand  to  Rome  or 
Paris,  nor  have  we  Republicans  any  immediate 
intention  of  laying  powder-mines  imder  Wind- 
sor Castle.  .  .  .  She  will  understand  (to  be 
serious)  why  I  cannot  reply  to  her  letter.  I 
love  her  and  him  too  much  to  write  to  the  one 
about  the  other  when  I  see  it  is  hopeless  to  make 
the  one  share  my  love  for  the  other.  I  only 
wish  that  she  and  you  and  all  of  us  could  see 
him.  I  am  as  sure  as  I  am  of  writing  to  you 
now,  that  you  all,  or  anybody  who  was  not  a 
blockhead  or  a  blackguard,  would  throw  in 
their  lots  with  me.  I  have  heard  since  (from 
an  ultra-Tory)  two  little  facts  which  I  will  put 
in  here.  In  '64  there  was  a  row  about  Mazzini 
in  our  beautiful  Parliament, — and  some  name- 
less and  unnameable  creatiu*e  got  up  and  abused 

*  Mazzini. 


88  LETTERS 

my  chief.  At  the  end  Lord  Stanley  got  up  and 
simply  said — "Has  the  honourable  gentleman 
ever  seen  M.  Mazzini?"  .  .  .  Again,  when 
Orsini  had  failed  in  bombarding  M.  Louis 
Bonaparte,  and  the  chief  was  accused  of  taking 
part  in  the  affair  (1857,  if  you  remember)  and 
had  put  forth  in  a  letter  to  the  Times  his  denial 
— saying  in  his  great  way  that  he  never  did 
write  to  papers  or  notice  accusations,  but  now 
he  would  for  the  sake  of  others — the  Times  next 
morning  opened  its  first  leading  article  with  a 
remark  to  the  effect  that  the  question  was  now 
set  at  rest,  and  he  had  nothing  to  do  with  it. 
"M.  Mazzini  has  said  so;  and  M.  Mazzini  never 
lied.''  Those  were  the  words.  Now  please 
remember  who  Ld.  Stanley  is,  and  what  the 
Times  is.  You  could  not  find  anywhere  a  man 
or  a  journal  more  averse  to  Mazzini's  principles. 
I  don't  know  when  such  a  tribute  was  paid  by 
unfriendly  hands  to  the  greatness  and  goodness 
of  any  man.  As  for  me,  all  I  say  in  defence  of 
my  idolatry  is  this:  I  just  ask  you  to  meet  my 
chief.  I  know  you  too  well  to  doubt  the  result 
— for  I  believe  fully  in  the  maxim  of  Dr.  Arnold. 
...  I  took  courage  to  tell  the  chief  that  it  was 
in  our  sort  of  people  that  he  must  look  for  real 
faith  and  self-devotion  to  a  cause  which  could 


PHILIP  B.  MARSTON  89 

do  us  personally  no  good  and  no  harm — not  in 
the  Bright  (Anglican-Radical)  set.  Don't  let 
[my  parents]  have  any  uneasiness  or  vexation 
about  me  because  I  have  at  last  attained  the 
honour  of  meeting  my  chief.  Even  that  cannot 
make  me  love  him  more  or  believe  more  in  the 
Republican  cause.  .  .  . 

I  must  stay  here  some  time  on  account  of  my 
portrait,  which  is  not  yet  begun,  but  as  people 
say  I  am  looking  quite  well  again  I  shall  sit  at 
once.  And  I  think  I  shall  stay  up  for  the  Exhi- 
bition, &c.,  and  then  come  down  for  a  bit  if  you 
will  have  me.  But  I  hope  you  will  all  come  up 
for  the  said  Exhibition,  early. 

Last  night  I  had  to  entertain  a  poor  boy  of 
sixteen,  son  of  Dr.  {not  M.D.)  Westland  Marston, 
all  but  wholly  blind,  who  for  some  time  has 
lived  (his  friends  tell  me)  on  the  hope  of  seeing 
me  (as  far  as  he  can  see) .  I  thought  it  so  touch- 
ing, remembering  my  own  enthusiasms  at  that 
age — that  I  said  I  should  be  glad  to  have  him 
at  my  rooms  (with  his  father  and  a  friend  or 
two)  and  they  chose  last  night.  The  day  be- 
fore a  friend  brought  me  the  most  frantic  set 
of  verses  written  by  this  poor  blind  fellow  and 
addressed  to  me.  I  was  rather  worried,  but  I 
thought  of  his  affliction  and  made  up  my  mind 


90  LETTERS 

to  read  the  poem  and  make  him  as  happy  as  I 
could.  And  I  think  for  once  I  have  succeeded 
in  doing  another  a  good  turn,  for  he  certainly 
did  enjoy  the  occasion.  I  gave  him  chocolate 
bon-bons,  etc.,  and  read  to  the  company  im- 
published    things   of   mine — among   others   the 

little  old  Jacobite  song  that  you  and  A liked 

so  much  when  I  read  it  you  at  Holmwood.  It 
was  really  very  touching  to  see  the  face  that 
could  just  see  where  I  was  across  the  table 
looking  at  me — and  growing  so  feverishly  red 
that  his  father  went  over  once  or  twice  to  see  if 
he  was  all  right.  It  is  not  because  he  went  in 
for  me  that  I  cared  about  it,  but  a  thing  of  that 
sort  must  make  one  compassionate.  .  .  .  And 
he  did  seem  to  enjoy  himself  so  much  that  I 
really  felt  it  was  worth  living,  to  give  so  much 
pleasure  to  a  poor  boy  afflicted  as  he  is  from  his 
birth. 


To  the  same 


22A,  Dorset  Street, 

Aug.  13th. 


I  send  you  two  letters  from  Lord  Lytton 
about  my  book,  which  are  worth  many  reviews. 
.  .  .  The  printed  reviews  have  pitched  into  me 
so  violently  that  the  head  of  Moxon's  firm  re- 


LORD  LYTTON  91 

fuses  to  fulfil  his  agreement  to  sell  any  more 
copies  or  make  me  any  compensation.  So  I 
suppose  I  shall  have  to  go  elsewhere. 

I  am  going  to  Lord  Lytton's  on  Thursday 
(the  1 6th).  He  has  written  me  this  morning 
a  very  kind,  long  letter. 

To  the  same 

22A,  Dorset  Street, 

Aug.  28th. 

...  I  left  Underworth  on  Thursday  after  a 
very  pleasant  week.  Lord  Lytton  was  most 
kind  and  friendly,  and  we  had  long  talks  over 
all  sorts  of  things  and  books  and  places.  One 
day  I  got  a  letter  from  a  clergyman  expressing 
admiration  of  my  last  book  and  indignation  at 
the  attacks  made  on  it,  and  sending  me  a  voltime 
of  his  sermons  in  return;  rather  an  odd  tribute, 
but  satisfactory  as  showing  I  have  not  really 
scandalized  or  Jiorripile  all  the  respectable  world. 
We  drove  up  to  London  the  whole  way  from 
Knebworth  (30  miles)  in  Ld.  Lytton's  private 
carriage,  taking  luncheon;  it  was  a  nice  change 
from  railways,  and  very  queer  entering  London 
gradually  in  that  way.  As  we  drove  in  he  told 
me  a  most  exciting  ghost  story,  whereat  he  is 
great.     Another  day  we  went  to  Vcrulam  and 


92  LETTERS 

St.  Albans  and  over  the  ex-cathedral,  which  is 
superb. 

To  his  Mother 

Ap.  I2th  [no  year]. 

...  I  have  had  so  many  readings  and  read- 
ing to  a  company  is  just  the  most  tiring  thing 
I  know.  It  leaves  you  next  day  hardly  up  to 
writing  or  reading  either.  It  is  very  fascinating, 
and  I  don't  wonder  it  killed  Dickens.  The  in- 
toxicating effect  of  a  circle  of  faces  hanging  on 
your  words  and  keeping  up  your  own  excitement 
by  theirs  which  is  catching  even  when  your  own 
words  on  mere  paper  are  stale  to  you  is  such  that 
I  wonder  how  actors  stand  it  nightly — though 
after  all  it  passes  off  and  leaves  one  all  right. 

I  have  been  gathering  about  me  the  circle  of 
yoimger  poets  who  are  called  my  disciples  a 
moi  and  bestowing  the  impublished  Bothwell 
upon  their  weak  minds.  They  are  very  nice 
fellows  and  very  loyal  to  me  as  their  leader. 
There  are  5  or  6  aged  from  23  to  31  or  so  who 
have  been  presented  to  me  at  different  times. 
I  have  told  you  of  Philip  Marston,  the  blind 
youth  who  was  engaged  to  be  married  at  21  to 
a  very  beautiful  girl  who  died  before  the  wedding 
day.     I  am  so  sorry  for  him  that  his  face  haunts 


KARL  BLIND  93 

me  whenever  we  have  met, — but  I  am  told  my 
company  is  really  a  comfort  and  puts  some 
pleasure  into  his  life.  I  think  it  would  almost 
make  you  cry — for  it  almost  does  me — to  see 
how  his  sad  face  with  great  dark  eyes  just  filmed 
or  specked  so  that  you  would  not  know  at  first 
they  were  blind,  changes  and  brightens  some- 
times when  I  speak  or  shake  hands  with  him. 
One  comfort  is,  he,  for  one,  is  a  poet  of  real 
genius  as  well  as  love  for  his  art. 

To  the  same 

December    16    [no   year  date]. 

.  .  .  Though  you  may  not  look  at  it  with  the 
same  eyes  as  I  do,  I  think  you  will  sympathize 
with  me — knowing  what  it  is  to  me — when  I 
tell  you  that  I  have  had  a  7nost  kind  message 
from  Mazzini,  sent  from  his  sick-bed,  only 
making  too  much  of  my  poor  attempts  to  serve 
his  cause  by  writing.  He  is  getting  better,  and 
I  suppose  may  leave  Switzerland  for  England. 

To  the  same 

September  22nd. 

...  On  Sunday  evening  I  had  a  long  talk  on 
European    prospects    with    Karl    Blind    at    his 


94  LETTERS 

house.  I  am  afraid  the  old  fatal  anti-German 
feeling  in  France  has  yet  more  of  evil  seed  to 
bear, — and  I  can  hardly  feel  as  much  surprise 
as  sorrow.  One  only,  he  says,  of  the  republican 
French  papers  has  protested  against  it  and  the 
war  which  is  its  present  fruit ;  the  others,  if  they 
have  attacked  it,  have  not  attacked  it  as  a  crime, 
but  as  a  Bonapartism!  I  cannot  wonder  that 
the  leaders  of  German  intellect  and  action  should 
feel  as  it  appears  Bismarck  does  towards  France 
as  an  enemy  to  be  disabled  under  peril  of  fresh 
aggression:  and  therefore  I  can  see  no  probable 
term  at  hand  to  ruin  and  bloodshed  which  will 
not  be  the  germ  and  the  beginning  of  more  ruin 
and  bloodshed.  ...  I  know  only  one  German 
— a  very  able  man  and  ardent  patriot — ^who  is 
utterly  opposed  to  the  seizure  of  Alsace  and 
Lorraine,  as  worse  for  Germany  than  even  for 
France.  I  hope  such  opinions  may  soon  be 
commoner  than  I  fear  they  can  now  be  among 
his  cotintrymen.  J.  Faure  will  do  what  honesty 
and  moderation  can  do,  but  no  more;  and  just 
now  that  is  not  over  much. 

To  the  same 

June  2,  1884. 

.  .  .  Last  Wednesday  week  I  had  the  great 


SAFFI  95 

pleasure  and  honour  of  a  visit  from  Saffi,  to 
whom  I  presented  Bertie/  having  imbued  his 
young  mind  with  a  proper  sense  of  the  distinc- 
tion awaiting  him.  His  mother  and  uncle  were 
of  course  much  pleased  at  the  child's  being  pre- 
sented to  so  illustrious  a  man  as  one  of  the  rulers 
and  defenders  of  Rome  in  '49.  Nothing  could 
exceed  the  kindness  of  Saffi's  reception  of  him 
— and  when  I  mentioned  the  fact  that  B.  knew 
what  an  honour  he  was  enjoying,  our  guest 
looked  pleased  and  said — "Oh,  does  he  know 
about  the  Roman  revolution?"  "I  think," 
I  replied,  "you  may  trust  me  for  that."  And  he 
certainly  might.  Altogether,  Saffi's  little  visit 
to  the  country  where  he  lived  so  many  years  in 
exile  was  very  pleasant.  I  had  gone  the  Monday 
before  (this  day  fortnight)  to  meet  him  at  a 
farewell  luncheon  given  by  some  common  friends 
of  ours  before  his  leaving  England,  when  he 
was  kind  enough  to  accept  my  invitation  to 
come  and  see  me  and  my  books.  Some  of  the 
old  Italian  books  you  so  kindly  gave  me  inter- 
ested him  very  much,  with  their  lovely  old 
Renaissance  print  and  bindings.  He  is  getting 
grizzled — not   yet    grey — but   otherwise   seems 

•  A  child,  Mr.  Watts-Dunton's  nephew,  and  one  of  the  household 
at  the  Pines. 


96  LETTERS 

hardly  changed  at  all  from  what  he  was  nearer 
thirty  than  twenty  years  ago,  when  I  first  at- 
tended his  lectures  in  Oxford.  Watts,  of  course, 
felt  the  honour  done  us  as  I  did,  and  was  very 
much  gratified  to  have  made  the  acquaintance 
of  one  of  the  men  who  have  made  part  of  the 
history  of  this  century  a  history  of  heroic  action, 
devotion,  and  suffering.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

March   lo,  '96. 

I  am  indeed  very  sorry  for  the  Italian  reverses. 
Italy  has  always  been  next — and  very  near — to 
England  in  my  love  and  loyalty,  as  you  know. 
I  said  "we"  once,  speaking  of  Italians  as  op- 
posed to  their  enemies,  in  the  presence  of  Mazzini 
soon  after  I  had  been  presented  to  him,  and  of 
course  turned  to  him  and  said,  "I  beg  your 
pardon — I  am  saying  'we*  as  if  I  had  a  right — 
before  you.'"  And  he  smiled  and  said,  "I 
don't  know  who  has  a  right  to  call  himself  an 
Italian  if  you  haven't — if  you  like."  I  couldn't 
speak,  but  I  didn't  cry,  though  I  felt  like  it. 
But  how  splendidly  the  old  Roman  heroism  has 
proved  itself  alive  again  in  this  terrible  disaster! 


MAZZINI  97 

To  his  Youngest  Sister 

June  I,  1903. 

.  .  .  Nothing   indeed   could   surprise  me   to 

hear  of  A in  the  way  of  heroic  and  heavenly 

sweetness  of  nature.  I  have  known  one  other 
human  being  who  always  seemed  to  me  naturally 
(and  therefore  most  imconsciously)  above  all 
others  in  perfect  beauty  and  selfless  nobility  of 
character  and  temper  and  instinct.  And  that 
was  Mazzini.  Ever  since  I  knew  him  I  have 
been  able  to  read  the  Gospels  with  such  power 
of  realizing  and  feehng  the  truth  of  the  human 
character  of  Christ  as  I  have  never  felt  before. 

To  the  same 

March   27,    1903. 

.  .  .  Have  you  seen  or  heard  of  Signor  Galim- 
berti's  magnificent  compliment  to  me  in  the 
Italian  Parliament?  I  ought  to  be  writing  to 
him  if  I  were  not  writing  to  you. 

[The  following  short  cutting  from  a  newspaper 
commemorates  the  occasion] : 

"ITALIAN   EULOGY   ON    MR.    SWINBURNE 

''A  telegram  from  Ferrara  states  that  Signor 
Galimberti,  the  Italian  Minister  for  Posts  and 


98  LETTERS 

Telegraphs,  speaking  yesterday  at  a  solemn 
commemoration  of  the  fiftieth  anniversary  of 
the  death  of  three  citizens  of  Ferrara,  who  were 
shot  in  1853  by  the  Austrians  on  account  of 
their  Itahan  sentiments,  expressed  his  feelings 
of  warm  admiration  for  Mr.  Swinburne,  quoting 
verses  by  the  poet  breathing  a  spirit  of  affec- 
tion and  reverence  for  Italy  and  glorifying  the 
Italian  Revolution.  The  Minister  added  that 
Italy  owed  a  debt  of  gratitude  to  Mr.  Swinburne. 
The  enormous  crowd  assembled  in  the  Tosiborghi 
Theatre,  where  the  commemoration  took  place, 
loudly  cheered  the  Minister's  reference  to  the 
British  poet." 

To  his  Mother 

Arts  Club,  Hanover  Sq., 

Sunday,   March  31st.' 

I  must  write  again  to  tell  you  what  has  hap- 
pened to  me.  All  last  evening  and  late  into  the 
night  I  was  with  Mazzini.  They  say  a  man's 
highest  hopes  are  usually  disappointed:  mine 
were  not.  I  had  never  dared  to  dream  of  such 
a  reception  as  he  gave  me.  At  his  desire,  I 
read  him  my  verses  on  Italy  straight  through; 

'  Many  of  these  most  interesting  letters  are  undated,  beyond  the 
month,  and  have  no  envelope  or  postmark.  This  one  would  appear 
to  be  about  the  same  period  as  that  of  April,  '67. 


MAZZINI  99 

of  course  I  felt  awfully  shy  and  nervous  when 
I  came  to  the  part  about  him  personally,  but 
when  I  looked  up  at  him  I  saw  such  a  look  on 
his  face  as  set  me  all  right  again  at  once.  If  you 
had  ever  seen  him,  I  am  sure  you  would  love 
him  as  I  do.  I  had  heard  he  was  growing  rather 
frail  and  weak  with  years  and  troubles.  But 
he  was  as  bright  and  fresh  and  energetic  as  a 
man  could  be.  I  am  not  going  to  try  and  tell 
you  what  he  did  me  the  honour  to  say  about  my 
poetry  and  the  use  of  my  devotion  and  beHef 
to  his  cause.  He  says  there  is  too  much  of 
him  in  my  poem  on  Italy.  I  wanted  to  know 
how  one  could  have  done  it  otherwise.  He  has 
asked  me  to  go  and  see  him  whenever  I  like. 
The  minute  he  came  into  the  room,  which  was 
full  of  people,  he  walked  straight  up  to  me  (who 
was  standing  in  my  place  and  feeling  as  if  I 
trembled  all  over)  and  said,  "I  know  yoii,'"  and 
I  did  as  I  always  thought  I  should  and  really 
meant  not  to  do  if  I  could  help — went  down  on 
my  knees  and  kissed  his  hand.  He  held  mine 
between  his  for  some  time  while  I  was  reading, 
and  now  and  then  gave  it  a  great  pressure.  He 
says  he  will  take  me  to  Rome  when  the  revolu- 
tion comes,  and  crown  me  with  his  own  hands 
in  the  Capitol.     He  is  as  ready  to  go  in  for  a 


100 


LETTERS 


little  joke  such  as  this  or  bit  of  fun,  and  talk 
about  anything  that  may  turn  up,  as  if  he  was 
nobody.     He  is  a  born  king  and  chief  and  leader 
of  men.    You  never  saw  such  a  beautiful  smile 
as  his.     He  is  not  the  least  bit  discouraged  or 
disheartened — ^and  I  don't  know  how  any  one 
could  be  who  had  ever  seen  his  face.     It  is 
literally  full  of  light;  he  has  the  largest  and 
brightest  dark  eyes  in  the  world.     He  is  clearly 
the  man  to  create  a  nation — to  bid  the    dead 
bones  live  and  rise.    And  he  is  as  simple  and 
gentle  and  pleasant — ^with  the  most  exquisite 
refinement  of  manner — as  any  one  could  be. 
In  cast  of  feature  he  is  a  little  like  my  uncle 
Ashbumham,  on  a  smaller  scale  of  size,  with 
twice  the  life  and  expression.     I  know,  now  I 
have  seen  him,   what   I  guessed  before,  why, 
whenever  he  has  said  to  any  one,  "Go  and  be 
killed  because  I  tell  you,"  they  have  gone  and 
been  killed  because  he  told  them.   Who  wouldn't, 
I  should  like  to  know?     I  never  answered  his 
letter,  but  last  night  I  told  him  that  on  receiving 
it  I  felt  there  was  but  one  person  on  earth  to 
turn  to  and  tell  of  this  great  honour  and  delight, 
and  that  of  course  was  my  mother.     1  think  it 
pleased  him.     I  know  he  was  very  fond  of  his. 
But  though  she  had  a  greater  and  better  son, 


MAZZINI  loi 

I  don't  think  she  had  one  more  fond  of  her.  .  .  . 
.  .  .  Please  give  him  [his  father]  for  Tuesday 
my  best  love  and  many  happy  returns  of  the 
day.  My-  birthday  I  mean  to  consecrate  by 
going  to  the  Chief.  I  must  stay  up  a  Uttle 
because  of  my  portraits,  or  else  I  should  have 
run  down  already.  Powell  is  in  town,  and  full 
of  Mme.  Schumann's  concerts.  I  hope  to  be 
able  to  go  with  him  and  hear  her.  He  has  be- 
stowed on  me  a  superb  photographic  album, 
which  was  a  most  acceptable  present,  as  I  wanted 
one  to  put  you  all  into. 

Ever  your  most  affec.  son. 

To  the  same 

Arts  Club,  Hanover  Square, 

May  7th. 

[No  year  given,  but  by  address  and  hand- 
writing evidently  near  the  period  of  the  first 
letter  about  Mazzini,  or  beginning  of  'seventies.] 

...  As  to  my  chief,  if  you  are  really  anxious 
about  his  influence  upon  me,  you  may  be  quite 
at  rest.  I  do  not  expect  you  to  regard  him  with 
my  eyes,  but  you  must  take  my  word  for  it 
that  nothing  but  good  can  come  from  the  great 
honour  and  delight  of  being  admitted  to  see 

•  His  father's  birthday  was  four  days  before  his  own. 


102  LETTERS 

and  talk  with  him.  He  is  always  immensely 
kind  and  good  to  me,  but  all  he  wants  is  that  I 
should  dedicate  and  consecrate  my  writing  power 
to  do  good  and  serve  others  exclusively;  which 
I  can't.  If  I  tried  I  should  lose  my  faculty  of 
verse  even.  When  I  can,  I  do;  witness  my  last 
book,  which  I  hope  you  have  received  at  last.  .  .  . 
You  must  all  come  up  for  the  picture  exhibi- 
tions of  the  year,  which  are  excellent,  as  if  to 
make  up  for  last  year's  failures.  There  is  no 
very  great  picture  in  the  Academy,  but  quite 
an  unusual  show  of  good  ones,  in  my  htimble 
opinion.  Tell  M.  to  go  and  look  at  a  small  boy 
by  Millais,  whose  (the  child's,  not  the  painter's) 
father  I  know  very  well;  I  think  it  will  gratify 
her.  It  is  seriously  a  lovely  bit  of  painting, 
and  of  a  really  pretty  child;  a  better  picture 
than  his  more  ambitious  ones,  which  disap- 
pointed me.  Old  Landseer's  white  bulls  are 
perfectly  magnificent,  both  beasts  and  painting. 
There  are  very  few  good  landscapes,  but  two  or 
three  really  good  seascapes — one  by  Hook,  a 
boat  rowed  by  boys  on  the  edge  of  a  full  rising 
wave,  curving  into  a  solid  mound  of  water  be- 
fore it  breaks;  both  the  faces  (the  elder  half- 
laughing,  the  younger  boy  grave  and  girding 
himself  up  for  the  pull)  and  the  water  are  quite 


MAZZINI  103 

right.  It  made  me  thirsty  to  be  in  between 
the  waves.  Whistler,  who  doesn't  like  Hook's 
pictures  as  a  rule,  pointed  it  out  to  me  as  good. 


To  the  same 

22A,  Dorset  Street, 
Oct.  1st. 

I  scrawl  you  in  haste  just  a  line  to  say  I  keep 
quite  well  and  to  thank  you  for  the  most  wel- 
come letter  just  forwarded  enclosing  a  note  from 
Gaeta  with  good  news  of  Mazzini,  whom  Mme. 
Venturi  has  succeeded  in  rejoining  after  a  jour- 
ney impeded  as  you  may  suppose  by  various 
delays  and  difficulties.  Her  company  and  care 
will  I  know  be  more  to  him  than  anything. 
"He  is  well,"  she  tells  me,  "in  health  and  be- 
loved (of  course)  by  all  who  go  near  him."  This 
last  has  always  been  the  case.  I  only  hope  the 
health  may  prove  as  certain  and  durable.  You 
can  guess  what  a  comfort  the  note  is  to  me. 
Now  I  must  write  to  another  friend  of  his  whom 
the  news  may  not  yet  have  reached  and  who  has 
suffered  great  anxiety  and  sorrow  since  his 
imprisonment,  and  deserves  to  share  the  relief 
as  soon  as  possible.  ... 

I  hope  you  got  three  copies  of  my  Ode  all 


104  LETTERS 

right  as  sent.  I  am  only  too  glad  you  should 
like  a  poem  of  mine  well  enough  to  care  to  have 
them.  .  .  . 

It  has  been  (with  its  author)  violently  attacked 
and  ridiculed  in  the  Saturday  Review.  This, 
of  course,  I  expected,  and  was  only  too  much 
flattered  at  so  small  a  pamphlet  being  at  once 
thought  worth  so  long  and  full  a  notice  as  two 
close  columns  and  more  of  abuse,  political  and 
other. 

To  the  same 

[Undated.] 

It  has  been  one  thing  after  another  in  the 
way  of  engagements  that  has  kept  me  back — 
but  nothing  in  the  way  of  illness.  Only  you 
can't  think  how  I  get  flooded  with  letters  and 
invitations  and  that  sort  of  thing  (and  some 
from  people  who  are  real  friends  to  me)  that  I 
don't  like  to  leave  town  without  answering 
either  by  a  call  or  by  a  note.  You  must  take 
my  word  for  it  when  I  say  I'll  come  down  the 
very  first  day  I  can — even  if  only  for  a  day  or 
two  before  you  start  north.  What  kept  me 
from  coming  to  Holmwood  a  week  since  was 
really  serious — the  offer  of  a  seat  in  Parliament 


OFFER  OF  A  SEAT  IN  PARLIAMENT    105 

next  session  if  I  would  only  allow  my  name  to 
be  put  up.  Of  course  I  felt  myself  flattered, 
but  at  first  objected  on  the  grounds  that  I  was 
not  fit  or  properly  trained,  and  might  be  taking 
a  better  man's  place — but  most  of  my  friends 
have  been  day  after  day  urging  and  pressing 
me  to  accept.  Still  I  don't  think  it  is  my  line. 
But  you  will  understand  this  has  detained  me 
and  given  me  a  great  deal  to  think  about.  .  .  . 
Of  course  this  business  is  rather  upsetting  alto- 
gether. I  know  I  don't  want  the  "honour" 
— but  a  friend  said  to  me  the  other  day,  "If  you 
believe  what  you  say  and  write  you  ought  to 
sacrifice  your  time  and  comfort  to  your  coimtry." 
But  I  don't  think  I  will — in  that  way.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

12,  North  Crescent, 
March  12th. 

.  .  .  You  will  see  by  to-day's  papers  that  I 
have  lost  the  man  whom  I  most  loved  and  hon- 
oured of  all  men  on  earth.  I  am  not  in  the 
htimour  to  write  about  it,  or  to  think  just  yet 
more  than  I  can  help:  and  in  your  time  of  mourn- 
ing I  do  not  want  to  intrude  upon  you  my  other 
personal  cause  of  sorrow.  But  of  course  you 
and  my  father  will  know  that  it  is  a  great  loss 


io6  LETTERS 

to  me  as  it  is  to  the  world  which  was  not  worthy 
of  the  great  and  good  man  now  removed  from 
it.  However,  there  is  left  to  us  who  knew  him 
his  beloved  memory,  and  the  recollection  which 
we  shall  carry  with  us  till  we  die  that  we  were 
honoured  by  his  friendship.  All  who  knew  him, 
high  or  low,  loved  him  with  all  their  heart;  and 
he  returned  their  affection — never  forgetting 
or  overlooking  any  one — ever  taking  thought 
for  all  others — as  devoted,  tender,  and  unselfish 
in  the  details  of  his  life  as  in  its  great  things; 
but  indeed  it  always  seemed  to  me  that  he  made 
all  things  great  that  touched  him  by  the  greatness 
of  his  own  nature.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

June  22,  1882. 

...  I  thought  I  might  as  well  spend  five 
minutes  and  a  penny  on  sending  you  a  news- 
paper article  which  I  have  just  read  with  inter- 
est— as  I  always  do  anything  which  concerns 
Cardinal  Newman,  whose  genius  and  character 
I  admire  as  much  as  I  detest  the  creed  to  which 
he  has  (in  his  own  phrase)  "assented"  by  be- 
coming a  Papist.  ...  I  converted  Watts  (who 
did  not  know  his  verses  in  the  Lyra  Apostolica) 
to  enthusiastic  belief  in  the  Cardinal  as  a  poet. 


CARDINAL  NEWMAN  107 

not  long  since,  by  repeating  a  stanza  or  two  from 
memory.  It  is  delicious  to  me  (selfishly — be- 
cause of  my  own  failures  in  examination)  to 
find  that  the  Newman  did  not  shine  in  the  class- 
list,  and  that  his  immeasurably  inferior  brother 
did.  Jowett  once  described  Professor  F.  New- 
man to  me,  in  his  most  incisive  and  thinnest 
voice,  as  "a  good  man — who  is  always  in  the 
wrong."  I  would  not  say  always — but  certainly 
I  don't  think  he  is  a  man  of  whose  intellectual 
sympathy  those  who  (in  some  things)  think 
with  him  need  be  proud.  .  .  . 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

Aug.  13,  '90. 

.  .  .  Have  you  seen  Hy.  Fumiss's  carica- 
ture of  me  in  this  morning's  Punch,  tearing  out 
my  last  few  hairs  in  agony  at  finding  that  no 
member  of  the  Tory  Government  had  read  or 
heard  of  my  poem?  I  think  it  a  capital  carica- 
ture— and  Walter  and  I  have  laughed  over  it  all 
the  more  heartily  for  remembering  how  very 
imaginative  an  idea  it  is  that  I  should  have 
expected  these  worthy  and  useful  and  service- 
able Tories  to  read  or  understand  mine  or  any 
one's  verses. 

.  .  .  When   I   began  this  letter  I   meant  to 


io8  LETTERS 

write  about  what  I  have  naturally  been  think- 
ing of  a  good  deal  since  yesterday  morning — the 
death  of  Cardinal  Newman.  For  many  years 
he  has  been  an  interesting  study  to  me — ever 
since,  at  the  earnest  entreaty  of  a  worthy  Roman 
Catholic  friend  whom  I  have  long  since  lost 
sight  of,  I  read,  learnt,  marked,  and  inwardly 
digested,  his  wonderful  book,  The  Grammar  of 
Assent  (I  should  call  it  The  Accidence  of  Atheism) 
— [so]  that  his  death  revives  the  sense  of  wonder 
and  curiosity  which  I  felt  on  reading  a  religious 
book  full  of  beautiful,  earnest,  noble  feeling,  as 
well  as  exquisite  writing  and  subtle  reasoning, 
which  proves  that  the  writer  had  forgotten — or, 
I  rather  incline  to  think,  can  never  have  known 
— ^the  meaning  of  the  word  "belief."  Page 
after  page  I  read,  and  thought  "Why,  he's 
giving  up  everything — how  on  earth  is  he  ever 
going  to  make  out  that  it's  right — or  possible 
— to  believe  in  anything — in  God,  in  the  soul, 
in  a  future  life,  or  any  conceivable  object  of 
belief?"  And  he  doesn't.  He  thinks  you  had 
better  "assent" — accept  anything — "open  your 
mouth  and  shut  your  eyes,"  as  children  say — 
and  make  up  your  mind  that  you  won't  disbe- 
lieve it!  I  said — if  I  rightly  remember — to  the 
man  who  had  begged  me  to  read  the  book,  that 


CARDINAL  NEWMAN  109 

I  never  before  imderstood  the  meaning  of  the 
word  "infidel,"  and  never  could  have  imagined 
any  intelligent  creature  existing  in  such  a  state 
of  utter  unbelief.  I  should  like  to  hear  what 
St.  Paul  would  have  said  to  a  professing  convert 
who  "assented"  after  such  a  fashion!  Of 
course  one  cannot  but  think  what  others  would 
have  thought  of  it — St.  John  and  St.  James; 
and  above  all,  what  their  Master  while  on  earth 
would  have  said  to  such  a  disciple. 

And  the  curious  thing  is  that  it  is  impossible 
to  read  this  amazing  book  without  being  im- 
pressed by  the  perfect  sincerity,  the  single- 
minded  purity  of  purpose,  the  earnest  simplicity 
and  devotion,  which  impelled  the  author  to 
write  a  book  so  much  more  than  atheistic  that 
one  wants  an  extra — or  ultra — epithet  to  define 
the  tendency  of  its  teaching.  Perhaps  the  old 
Puritan  term  "nuUifidian"  (believer  in  nothing) 
would  be  the  most  accurate  and  appropriate. 

I  hope  I  have  not  bored  you  by  all  this  im- 
provisation about  the  man  whom  all  the  papers 
are  writing  about,  and  who  at  all  events  must 
live  as  a  poet  by  grace  of  two  splendid  little 
poems  in  the  Lyra  Apostolica  (which  you — and 
others — gave  me  so  many  years  ago) . 

I   am  very   hard   at  work   reviewing  Victor 


no 


LETTERS 


Hugo's  new  posthumous  book — En  Voyage — 
which  I  think  you  would  like  to  read;  especially 
the  letters  written  while  travelling  among  the 
Pyrenees  (Cauterets,  etc.)-  •  •  . 


To  his  Mother 

4,  Grafton  Street, 
Mar.  13  [1862]. 

I  am  sure  you  will  understand  how  that  which 
has  happened  since  I  last  wrote  to  you  has  upset 
my  plans  and  how  my  time  has  been  taken  up. 
Till  last  week  when  I  was  laid  up  with  a  bad  turn 
of  influenza  I  have  been  almost  always  with 
Rossetti.  For  the  last  few  days  I  have  been 
with  a  friend  in  the  country  and  am  nearly  quite 
right  again. 

I  would  rather  not  write  yet  about  what  has 
happened — I  suppose  none  of  the  papers  gave 
a  full  report,  so  that  you  do  not  know  that  I 
was  almost  the  last  person  who  saw  her  (except 
her  husband  and  a  servant)  and  had  to  give 
evidence  at  the  inquest.  Happily  there  was  no 
difficulty  in  proving  that  illness  had  quite  de- 
ranged her  mind,  so  that  the  worst  chance  of  all 
was  escaped.  ...  I  am  only  glad  to  have 
been  able  to  keep  him  company  and  be  of  a  little 
use  during  these  weeks. 


ROSSETTI  III 

Rossetti  and  I  are  going  to  live  together  as 
soon  as  we  move — of  course  he  could  not  stay 
in  the  old  house,  and  asked  me  to  come  with 
him.  Luckily  I  had  put  off  deciding  on  a  lodg- 
ing as  it  would  have  been  a  great  plague  to 
change  again.  In  the  autumn  we  get  into  a 
house  at  Chelsea — in  Cheyne  Walk,  facing  the 
trees  and  river — with  an  old  garden.  The 
house  is  taken  (like  every  other  nice  one)  for 
the  Exhibition  season,  so  we  must  make  shift 
somewhere  till  then  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

12,  North  Crescent, 
Jan.  22nd. 

I  forgot  to  give  you  Rossetti 's  message  of 
thanks  for  the  Photo  of  me ;  he  was  very  pleased 
at  your  thinking  of  him  to  send  it  to;  but  he 
and  my  friends  generally  do  not  think  it  at  all 
a  good  likeness  of  me — they  say  the  down- 
looking  pose  is  so  entirely  imlike  and  unchar- 
acteristic of  me.  I  said  you  thought  the 
reverse,  but  R.  maintains  that  my  natural 
action  (not  of  course  when  reading,  but  when 
talking,  etc.)  is  to  hold  my  head  well  up,  and 
not  down. 


112  LETTERS 

To  the  same 

The  Pines,  Putney  Hill, 
Dec.  29,  1894. 

.  .  .  Christina  Rossetti  died  this  morning 
and  he  [Watts-Dunton]  has  to  write  an  obitu- 
ary notice  of  her.  I  shall  always  greatly 
regret  that  my  earnest  wish  and  hope  to 
have  the  great  privilege  and  pleasure  of  mak- 
ing you  all  personally  acquainted  with  her 
should  have  been  frustrated.  Apart  from 
her  exquisite  genius  as  a  poet,  and  the 
sympathy  in  religious  views  which  made  her 
say  to  me  once  how  she  should  like  to 
know  you  all  from  that  ground  (as  she  did, 
I  imderstood,  some  friends  and  acquaintances 
of  yours),  she  was  one  of  the  most  naturally 
attractive  and  delightful  people  I  ever  met. 
You  must,  I  think,  have  liked  her  for 
herself,  even  if  you  had  nothing  in  common 
with  her.  There  was  a  mixture  of  frank- 
ness and  gentleness  in  her  manner — straight- 
forward without  brusquerie,  and  reserved 
without  gaucherie — ^which  was  natural  and 
peculiar  to  her.  You  will  be  almost  as 
glad  as  I  was  to  know  that  her  good  brother 
— the    support    and    mainstay    of    his    family 


CHRISTINA  ROSSETTI  113 

for   so   many    years — was   daily  with  her  till 
the  end.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

Jan.  I,  1895. 

.  .  .  This  is  merely  a  postscript  enclosing  a 
couple  of  newspaper  cuttings  about  dear  Miss 
Rossetti  which  I  thought  some  or  all  might  care 
to  see.  The  last  words  I  wrote  last  night  and 
last  year  before  going  up  to  bed  at  midnight 
were  some  lines  in  memory  of  her,  which  Walter 
liked  much.  The  little  elegy  is  not  finished  or 
filled  up,  but  perhaps  you  may  care  to  read  the 
opening  and  closing  lines.  ...  I  looked  out  of 
window  just  before  beginning  to  write,  and 
have  never  seen  a  more  magnificent  heavenful 
of  stars.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

Hotel  de  France,  Vichy, 
Aug.  13,  '69. 

I  must  say  I  do  wish  your  doctor  had  sent  you 
here  .  .  .  and  not  only  we  should  have  met 
prematurely,  but  I  should  have  had  the  delight 
of  introducing  to  you  and  to  [his  father]  my  dear 


114  LETTERS 

friend  Biirton.  It  is  this  that  I  most  want  to 
make  you  understand — I  have  written  to  A. 
about  the  volcano  and  cathedrals — but  if  you 
had  seen  him,  when  the  heat  and  the  climb  and 
the  bothers  of  travelling  were  too  much  for  me — 
in  the  very  hot  weather — nursing,  helping,  wait- 
ing on  me — agoing  out  to  get  me  books  to  read  in 
bed — and  always  thoughtful,  kind,  ready,  and 
so  bright  and  fresh  that  nothing  but  a  lizard  (I 
suppose  that  is  the  most  insensible  thing  going) 
could  have  resisted  the  influence — I  feel  sure 
you  would  like  him  (you  remember  you  said  you 
didn't)  and  then,  love  him,  as  I  do:  I  have  been 
now  nearly  a  month  alone  with  him — and  I 
tell  you  this,  he  is  so  good,  so  true,  kind,  noble, 
and  brave,  that  I  never  expect  to  see  his  like 
again — but  him  I  do  hope  to  see  again,  and 
when  time  comes  to  see  him  at  Damascus  as 
H.B.M.  Consul.  "What  a  Hft  in  life  [as  I  told 
him]  for  a  low-minded  and  benighted  Republi- 
can!" .  .  .  We  have  met  here  {i.  e.,  she  saw 
my  name  down  among  the  visitors  and  hunted 
me  up)  the  author  of  the  Week  in  a  French  Country 
House,  and  tho'  I  do  not  like  being  hunted,  I 
found  it  was  worth  while  playing  the  pretty 
to  the  old  lady,  as  she  plays  and  sings  to 
me  in  private  by  the  hour,  and  her  touch  and 


TOUR  IN  AUVERGNE  115 

her  voice  are  like  a  young  woman's.  But — • 
they  have  sent  her  here  to  get  down  her  fat — • 
and ! 

To  the  same 

Hotel  Castiglione,  Paris, 
Aug.  31st  [year  evidently  same  as  foregoing]. 

Since  I  last  wrote  to  A.  on  the  eve  of  our  leav- 
ing Vichy  we  have  done  our  tour  in  Auvergne 
— and  I  only  wish  (and  wished)  that  you  all 
could  have  been  of  the  party.  [His  father]  I 
think  would  have  especially  enjoyed  the  explo- 
ration we  made  of  the  rock  country  and  its 
formation  of  basalt.  I  never  saw  anything  of 
the  sort  so  grand ;  and  the  only  one  of  the  party 
who  had  seen  Staffa  said  that  it  was  on  a  much 
lesser  and  slighter  scale  than  this.  There  is 
between  Le  Puy  and  Polignac  one  great  cliff 
front  of  towering  columns  which  faces  the  valley 
of  the  Borne  River — columns  broken  off  at  a 
great  height,  and  as  regular  as  if  designed  for 
a  cathedral:  then  a  lower,  more  abrupt  and 
irregular  range;  and  then,  further  west,  and 
covering  a  whole  hillside,  an  immense  heap  of 
the  same  basaltic  columns  crushed  sideways 
and  slanting  out  of  the  accumulated  weight  and 


Ii6  LETTERS 

increasing  pressure  of  the  growing  mountain 
thrown  up  above  it.  Then  bowed  and  broken 
pillars  lying  like  this 


only  still  and  much  more  irregularly,  which 
makes  me  sure  that  even  I  can  draw  the  lines 
so  as  to  show  what  sort  of  shape  they  have  taken 
— look,  as  Burton  said,  "like  a  bundle  of  petri- 
fied faggots  under  some  giant's  arm" — forming 
a  whole  mountain-side.  I  wanted  to  climb 
them  and  get  over  the  crest  of  the  hill,  but 
Burton  dissuaded  me,  though  I  am  sure  I  could: 
but  as  I  had  done  three  pretty  good  climbs  the 
same  morning,  I  consented  to  not.  I  send  what 
survives  after  the  journey  to  Paris  of  some  flowers 
I  gathered  at  the  foot  of  the  highest  cliffs  and 
others  from  the  ruin  of  the  Chateau  de  Polignac 
.  .  .  but  I  am  afraid  the  best  flowers  are  lost 
or  spoilt.  I  did  gather,  and  lay  by  for  sending, 
some  pretty  specimens  of  bell-shaped  flowers 
which  were  new  to  me,  but  they  must  have  come 
to  grief  by  the  way.  Don't  believe  one  word 
that  the  wretch  Murray  says  about  the  cathedral 


TOUR  IN  AUVERGNE  117 

of  Le  Puy;  it  is  one  of  the  grandest  as  well  as 
one  of  the  strangest  churches  ever  biiilt,  and 
adapted  with  almost  a  miraculous  instinct  of 
art  to  the  tone  of  the  landscape  and  character 
of  the  coimtry  about,  where,  except  the  deep 
fields  and  lawns  of  grass  that  spread  about  and 
slope  up  from  the  narrow  valleys  made  by  the 
two  streams  Borne  and  Loire,  there  is  nothing 
but  alternately  brown  and  grey  mountain- 
land  ending  in  a  long  and  beautifully  undulat- 
ing circle  of  various  heights  and  ranges.  These 
mountain  colours  are  most  delicately  repeated 
in  the  alternate  stripes  of  the  cathedral  front; 
the  effect,  like  that  of  the  whole  town,  reminded 
me  as  well  as  Burton  (who  spent  18  months  there 
as  a  boy)  of  my  beloved  Siena.  Indeed  Le  Puy 
is  a  smaller  Siena — the  highest  praise  /  can  give. 
I  am  only  here  for  a  day  or  two,  and  intend 
to  go  on  first  (perhaps)  to  Etretat  and  then 
Guernsey  and  then  to  England.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

Arts  Club,  Hanover  Square, 
October  24th. 

I  was  very  glad  to  find  your  letter  waiting  for 
me — but  you  might  quite  as  well  have  sent  me 
a  line  to  Etretat,  for  in  a  little  bit  of  a  place  like 


ii8  LETTERS 

that  one  is  known  in  a  day  or  two.  I  had  a 
real  sea  adventure  there  which  I  will  tell  you 
about  when  we  meet.  I  had  to  swim  (Powell 
says)  over  two  miles  out  to  sea  and  was  picked 
up  by  a  fishing  boat;  but  luckily  I  was  all  right 
though  very  tired,  and  the  result  was  I  made 
immense  friends  with  all  the  fishermen  and 
sailors  about — who  are  quite  the  nicest  people 
I  ever  knew.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

The  Pines,  Putney  Hill, 
Aug.  12,  1885. 

I  must  write  a  word  of  thanks  for  your  letter 
at  once.  .  .  .  You  ought  not  to  fly  in  the  face 
of  the  fact  by  decrying  your  own  powers  as  a 
correspondent.  It  is  not  filial  vanity  or  pride 
in  my  mother  that  makes  me  think  so;  Watts, 
who  has  a  vast  correspondence,  always  says  he 
knows  no  letters  more  delightful  than  yours. 
You  could  not  write  a  dull  one  if  you  tried — 
which  well  you  ought  to  know  it.  .  .  .  Only 
as  you  say  that  letter- writing  is  one  of  the  two 
things  you  feel  most  tiring  afterwards,  I  would 
not  for  a7iy  nimiber  of  worlds  have  you  exhaust 
or  hurt  yourself  in  the  least  by  writing  to  the 
likes  of  me  except  when  quite  "so  dispoged" 


LA  TER  NOTICE  OF  B  URTONS  1 1 9 

in  the  body  as  well  as  in  the  mind.  .  .  .  Aug. 
13th.  I  could  not  finish  this  last  night,  and 
to-day  has  been  taken  up  by  a  visit  from  Cap- 
tain and  Mrs.  Burton,  both  looking  rather 
younger  than  ever — friendlier  and  pleasanter  they 
could  neither  look  nor  be.  She  said  at  parting 
she  had  not  had  such  a  pleasant  afternoon  for 
years.  I  showed  them  the  priceless  blackletter 
book  of  animals  which  I  owe  to  your  generosity, 
and  they  were  most  worthy  of  it.  Burton  ad- 
mitted that  in  none  of  his  travels  had  he  met 
with  $ome  of  those  darling  beasts  with  himian 
faces  and  birds  that  tie  their  necks  in  knots. 
But  as  for  the  infidelity  that  would  question 
their  existence,  he  could  only  regard  it  as  equally 
sinful  and  stupid.  And — on  a  more  serious 
subject,  he  was  talking  about  General  Gordon 
(an  old  friend  and  fellow  soldier  of  his),  and 
saying  what  a  much  abler  man  he  was  than  the 
people  who  have  been  scribbling  about  him 
since  his  death,  have  made  him  out  to  be.  .  .  . 


To  the  same 


3,  Great  James  Street, 

Oct.  22d. 


...  I  quite  agree  with  what  you  say  about 
J.  Morley's  article  on  Bothwell  and  its  superior- 


120  LETTERS 

ity  to  Ld.  Houghton's  for  instance — but  then 
one  must  remember  that  he  is  a  man  of  very 
much  deeper  and  more  solid  intellectual  power 
than  Ld.  H.  who,  I  must  say,  was  better  than  I 
expected.  But  I  quite  agree  with  you  and  not 
J.  M.  about  the  character  of  Darnley.  I  can't 
tell  you  how  glad  I  was  the  night  I  went  to  bed 
after  finishing  the  scene  of  his  murder,  to  think 
that  I  should  have  no  more  to  do  with  him! 
And — ^what  Morley  does  not  seem  to  see,  clever 
as  he  is,  and  you  do  see  by  instinct,  as  I  did 
when  I  was  writing  the  book — there  is  quite  as 
much  of  the  poor  wretch  as  could  possibly  be 
endured — and  I  was,  as  you  say,  "only  too 
thankful  to  be  rid  of  him." 

I  have  done  at  last  with  old  Chapman,  and 
got  most  of  my  proofs.  At  the  last  minute 
there  turned  up  an  imknown  poem  of  some 
length,  and  of  great  difficulty  to  construe,  on 
the  death  of  the  Lord  Russell  of  the  day,  which 
by  favour  of  Jowett's  friend  the  Duke  of  Bed- 
ford was  allowed  to  be  copied  for  this  edition 
of  Chapman,  and  I  had  to  read  and  review  it, 
adding  a  paragraph  to  the  Essay  which  I  fondly 
thought  was  completed.  ...  As  soon  as  I 
have  a  copy  printed  separately  (it  is  going  to  be 
issued  in  this  double  form,  in  small  type  as  a 


"BARRY  CORNWALL"  121 

preface  to  Chapman's  Poems,  and  in  a  hand- 
somer form  as  a  separate  independent  work  of 
mine)  I  will  send  you  a  copy. 

Now  I  come  to  what  I  was  going  to  begin 
writing  about,  only  I  thought  if  I  did  I  should 
end  without  saying  anything  else  I  had  to  say. 
You  may  have  noticed  a  fortnight  since   (on 
Sunday)   the  announcement  in   the   papers   of 
the   death   of   poor   old   Mr.    Procter    ("Barry 
Cornwall"),  the  last  left  of  the  poets  of  the  be- 
ginning of  the  century — and  I  dare  say  you  re- 
member the  letter  from  his  wife  that  I  showed 
you,  in  answer  to  my  "presentation"  of  a  copy 
of  "Bothwell,"  and  I  remember  you  thought  it 
very  nice  and  touching.     I  thought  you  might 
like  to  see  the  correspondence  I  have  had  during 
the  last  ten  days  with  the  poor  old  lady.     It 
began,  as  you  will  see,  by  her  asking  if  she  might 
publish  some  complimentary  verses  I  once  (six 
years  ago)  addressed  to  her  husband,  with  the 
note  which  accompanied  them.     Both  note  and 
verses  were  scribbled  off  on  the  spur  of  the 
moment  and  never  meant  for  publication,  but 
of  course  on  getting  the  first  of  the  three  notes 
I  enclose  I  wrote  at  once  to  tell  Mrs.  Procter 
to  make  any  use  she  pleased  of  them — and  I 
also  sat  up  that  night  (as  I  am  sitting  up  now  to 


122  LETTERS 

write  this,  for  if  I  write  letters  in  the  morning 
it  cuts  up  all  my  day  and  I  do  no  other  work — 
so  I  always  put  off  my  correspondence  till  lo 
P.M.)  writing  a  little  "epicede"  or  funeral  song 
for  the  deceased — because  I  thought  if  any 
verses  of  mine  addressed  to  him  were  to  be 
printed  directly  after  his  death,  there  ought  to 
be  some  rather  better  and  more  appropriate 
than  those  old  ones.  The  new  ones  you  will 
find  in  the  Fortnightly  for  next  month,  as  I  have 
this  morning  got  a  note  from  Morley  to  say 
"they  are  most  welcome  as  all  your  work  is" 
(they  came  so  late  in  the  month  that  I  thought 
they  might  be  too  late,  and  then  I  should  have 
sent  them  to  the  AthencBum),  and  he  adds,  in 
answer  to  a  word  of  acknowledgment  from  me 
of  his  Macmillan  article — "The  shabby  and 
beggarly  scrap  on  your  great  tragedy  deserves 
no  thanks  from  you;  it  is  a  poor  performance — 
but  I  was  stringently  limited  for  space":  which 
is  so  far  satisfactory  to  me  that  I  see  he  really 
had  not  time  and  room  to  do  what  I  thought  I 
should  have  done  in  his  place — enlarge  rather 
on  the  last  two  acts  (where  the  whole  heroism 
of  the  Queen's  character  comes  out)  than  on  the 
first  two  only,  as  he  has  done.  I  hope  you  will 
not  be  tired  of  deciphering  this  midnight  scrawl. 


MRS.  PROCTER  123 

To  the  same 

3,  Great  James  Street, 
Nov.  2d. 

I  am  now  writing,  not  at  night,  but  just  be- 
fore going  out  to  dine  and  spend  the  evening. 
Yesterday  I  was  again  at  Mrs.  Procter's,  as 
she  had  asked  me  to  give  her  a  visit  every  Sun- 
day I  could,  and  the  last  (but  yesterday)  I  did 
not  go.  They  are  packing  up  to  remove  from 
the  house  they  had  the  lease  of,  so  I  don't  know 
if  I  shall  see  them  again  before  they  leave;  but 
we  had  some  very  pleasant  and  interesting  talk. 
Mrs.  P.  is  a  link  with  such  far-off  famous  men 
and  times  that  she  has  got  a  letter  from  Bums 
addressed  to  her  mother,  and  (what  is  even  more 
interesting  to  me — and  that  is  saying  a  great 
deal)  remembers  a  Mr.  Sharpe  the  engraver 
bringing  to  the  house,  when  she  was  yet  a  young 
unmarried  lady,  the  man  of  all  others  who  were 
alive  in  any  part  of  this  century  (except,  per- 
haps, Shelley)  that  I  should  most  have  liked  to 
see  and  speak  to  in  person — Blake. 

I  daresay  you  will  have  seen  the  Fortnightly 
before  this  reaches  you.  My  verses  also  ap- 
peared in  the  Academy  (I  suppose  through  Mrs. 
P.  or  Morley — at  least  with  the  latter's  leave) 


124  LETTERS 

but  misdated  and  misprinted.  Mrs.  P.  and 
her  remaining  daughter  think  of  travelHng  for  a 
little  before  settling  down  in  their  new  home — 
which  I  think  is  a  natural  feeling — and  were 
consulting  me  about  localities — and  did  I  think 
Cannes  or  Mentone  would  be  nice?  {did  I!) 
Whereupon  I  lifted  up  my  voice  and  gave  them 
such  a  screed  of  eloquence  on  the  subject  of 
that  part  of  the  world  and  its  detestability  as 
amazed  but  (I  think)  convinced  their  weak 
minds.  Then  I  told  them  that  as  far  as  I  knew 
the  two  most  perfect  places  to  go  to  were  Tus- 
cany and  the  Pyrenees,  Pau  and  Cauterets, 
or  Pisa  and  Siena  and  San  Gimignano:  Florence 
being  too  full  and  fashionable  (I  should  suppose) 
for  people  who,  knowing  quantities  of  English 
acquaintance,  would  not  be  going  abroad  to 
look  for  society. 

I  don't  know  whether  you  will  care  (I  was 
really  very  glad)  to  hear  what  I  heard  from  an 
old  friend  of  mine,  Mr.  Lorimer  Graham,  our 
American  Consul  at  Florence,  that  poor  old 
Kirkup  has  at  last,  instead  of  getting  quite 
cracked  before  he  died  (as  I  fully  expected  some 
day  to  hear),  been  converted  from  his  spirit- 
rapping  nonsense,  and  given  up  "spiritualism" 
(as   those   vulgarest   of   materialists   have   the 


''SPIRITUALISM''  125 

impudence  to  call  their  nonsense  and  imposture). 
I  always  thought  that  he,  who  had  been  the 
friend  of  Landor  and  Browning  and  Trelawney 
(to  whom  he  sent  me  a  letter  of  introduction) 
and  is,  I  believe,  a  man  of  really  great  learning 
in  all  old  historic  Italian  matters,  was  fit  for 
something  better  than  the  part  of  a  dupe  to  such 
disgusting  impostures  as  he  has  now  been  awak- 
ened from  belief  in,  though  I  fear  through  a 
very  painful  process  of  detection  of  prolonged 
and  elaborate  deceit  and  cruel  villainy  in  those 
nearest  to  him  in  every  sense.  .  .  . 

I  have  felt  very  deeply  of  late  the  truth  of 
what  you  say,  that  there  is  no  pleasure  derived 
from  personal  success  or  triumph  comparable 
for  an  instant  to  that  which  comes  from  the 
sense  of  being  able  to  give  any  comfort  or  sup- 
port to  others:  but  this  is  no  new  doctrine  of 
feeling  to  me;  I  have  always  felt  and  believed 
it;  and  I  don't  think  that  for  the  fame  of  the 
greatest  man  of  an  age  I  would  exchange  one 
pressure  of  Mazzini's  hand  that  I  have  had 
in  answer  to  my  poor  words — impotent  and 
feeble  but  sincere  and  true  as  words  can  be 
that  come  from  the  very  heart — in  praise 
and  hopeful  prophecy  of  his  coimtry  and  his 
cause. 


126  LETTERS 

To  the  same 


3,  Gt.  Jas.  St., 
Nov.  15th. 


I  called  this  afternoon,  thro*  fog  and  rain,  on 
dear  old  Mrs.  P.,  and  she  told  me  she  appre- 
ciated them  (the  verses)  so  much  more  in  print; 
I  told  her  I  never  could  appreciate  a  poem  in 
MS.  myself.     She  also  told  me  to-day  what  I 

did  not  know — it  may  interest  A that  she 

met  Keats  several  times,  and  though  she  had 
no  conversation  with  the  young  man  (who  I 
suppose  had  not  then  written  the  poems  that 
make  one  cherish  his  name)  was  greatly  struck 
by  his  beauty — which  I  should  hardly  have 
expected  from  the  engraving. 

Perhaps  you  may  have  seen  in  the  papers  how 
terrible  a  loss  has  befallen  my  poor  friend 
Madox  Brown  in  the  death  of  his  only  son,  not 
yet  20,  and  a  boy  of  the  most  wonderful  promise 
both  in  painting  and  authorship;  and  a  nice 
unaffected  amiable  young  fellow  besides,  who 
was  already  quite  a  companion  for  his  poor 
father,  and  able  last  winter  when  he  was  laid 
up  with  a  bad  attack  of  gout  to  help  him  by 
finishing  a  great  picture  which  otherwise  could 
not  have  been  done  in  proper  time.  ...  It  is  as 
grievous  a  thing  as  I  can  remember  to  have  seen. 


MRS.  PROCTER  127 

To  the  same 

The  Pines,  Putney  Hill, 
May  3,  1883. 

From  the  Gaskells  we  went  on  to  call  on  Mrs. 
Procter — ^who  being  a  year  or  so  further  from 
eighty,  and  nearer  ninety  than  when  we  last 
met,  was  naturally  rather  more  bright,  active, 
witty,  and  amusing  than  before.  I  begin  to 
believe  that  old  body  is  immortal.  There  is 
not  an  atom  of  show  or  pretence  about  her; 
she  walks  like  a  girl  (her  own  granddaughter, 
if  she  had  one),  has  the  eyes  of  a  hawk,  and  I 
wish  I  had  half  her  hearing.  She  .  .  .  talks 
of  Charles  Lamb  and  his  sister,  Coleridge  and 
Wordsworth,  till  one  feels  as  if  one  might  and 
ought  to  call  on  them,  or  at  least  leave  cards 
for  them  on  the  next  landing.  Keats  and  Shel- 
ley seem  too  young  for  her  to  have  known — 
and  when  one  remembers  that  Byron  was  her 
husband's  schoolfellow  and  knew  him  at  Harrow, 
one  feels  inclined  to  say,  "Dear  me,  I  didn't 
think  Lord  B.  was  so  young  a  man  (or  would  be 
if  he  were  alive)." 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Sept.  I,  1888. 


I  must  apologize  for  being  ten  days  late  in 


128  LETTERS 

answering  your  last  letter,  but  I  have  been 
rather  busy  of  late.  I  should  have  liked  to  be 
with  you  when  the  heather  was  coming  into 
flower.  .  .  . 

I  am  very  proud  and  very  glad  that  

has  read  my  Armada  and  likes  it  so  well.  I  tried 
to  get  in  as  much  as  I  could  about  "our  part 
in  the  destruction"  (as  you  say)  and  I  thought 
I  had  done  fair  justice  to  the  English  fighters 
and  their  splendid  work  in  the  middle  part  of 
the  poem:  but  if  I  have  made  too  much  of  the 
sea  and  too  little  of  the  seamen,  I  am  sure  you 
will  agree  that  Watts 's  noble  "Ballad  of  the 
Armada"  in  the  Athenceum  has  made  ample 
amends  for  my  shortcomings.  He  tells  me  that 
soldiers  and  sailors  are  particularly  delighted 
with  it,  and  it  is  all  the  talk  of  the  United  Service 
or  naval  and  military  clubs :  and  I  don't  wonder. 
It  is  a  masterpiece  of  poetical  narrative.  May  I 
say  one  word  on  another  subject  which  you 
mention,  and  ask  you  not  to  "think  me  horrid"? 
(How  could  /  ever  think  you  anything  but  too 
kind  and  good  and  dear  in  any  comment  or 
remark  you  might  make  on  my  writings?)  I 
do  not  think  that  the  monstrous  doctrines  of 
Popery  can  be  described  as  "religious  errors." 
A  creed  which  makes  it  a  duty  to  murder  inno- 


THE  INQUISITION  129 

cent  men,  women,  and  children  by  tortures 
which  I  am  sure  you  could  not  bear  to  read  of 
is  not  an  "error" — it  is  the  worship  of  the  prin- 
ciple of  evil — or  in  other  words,  the  setting  up 
of  the  devil  in  place  of  God.  One  of  their  tenets 
was  (and  therefore  I  suppose  is — as  it  was  a 
Papal  "edict")  that  a  son  who  knew  or  sus- 
pected that  his  father  or  his  mother  held 
imorthodox  opinions  would  certainly  be  con- 
demned to  eternal  punishment  if  he  did  not 
betray  his  parent  to  the  Inquisition — not  merely 
to  death  (and  that  would  be  rather  monstrous, 
one  would  say)  but  to  torture  that  modern  men 
can  scarcely  endure  to  read  of.  Now,  there  is 
nothing  in  the  record  of  heathen  cruelty  or 
persecution  Hke  that.  Nero  himself  was  a 
baby — a  blessed  innocent — compared  to  the 
Fathers  of  the  Inquisition.  And  to  call  those 
people  Christians  seems  to  me  a  more  horrible 
insult  to  the  divine  name  of  Christ  than  ever 
was  offered  by  the  Jews  who  murdered  Him. 
If  we  are  to  believe  anything  recorded  in  the 
Gospels  we  must  believe — we  cannot  help  seeing 
— that  Christ  would  have  said  to  them  what 
He  said  to  the  Pharisees  (who  after  all  were 
not  such  monsters  as  these),  "Ye  are  of  your 
father  the  Devil." 


130  LETTERS 

I  trust  I  have  not  worried  you  with  this  ex- 
planation of  the  passages  in  my  poem  which 
seem  to  have  displeased  you — or  made  you 
wish  there  had  been  less  of  them;  but  of 
course  I  always  want  if  possible  to  explain 
and  justify  myself  to  you.  You  know — and 
if  you  did  not  I  certainly  could  not  find 
words  to  tell  you — how  much  I  value  your 
opinion  and  treasure  any  expression  of  your 
sympathy.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
Sept.  10,  1888. 

I  cannot  find  words  to  thank  you  for  your 
last.  ...  It  gave  me  the  deepest  comfort  and 
happiness  to  be  assured  that  you  agree  with 
me  that  "the  wicked" — and  also,  I  should  add, 
those  who  play  tricks  with  their  conscience  and 
sophisticate  their  understanding  into  belief  or 
acceptance  of  what  is  incredible  and  wicked — 
"do  make  a  God  of  the  father  of  lies."  That 
is  exactly  what  I  meant  to  say — and  what  I 
always  did  mean  to  say — in  every  line  I  have 
written  on  the  subject. 

It  is  only  less  gratifying  to  be  told  that  you 


CHILDREN  131 

like  my  Armada  better  "every  time  you  read 
it" — which  is  the  greatest  compliment  that  can 
be  paid  to  any  work. 

I  send  you  the  proof  of  my  poem  on  the  young 
person'  about  whom  I  wrote  in  my  last  letter. 
.  .  .  But  I  should  warn  you  that  ...  it  is  not 
worthy  of  the  subject;  and  that — as  stated  in 
the  5th  stanza — the  one  man  who  could  have 
written  a  poem  worthy  of  the  subject  was  Victor 
Hugo.  That  great  and  good  man  did  so  delight 
in  children  that  he  must  be  inconceivably  happy 
now  I  often  think — "for  of  such  is  the  kingdom 
of  heaven."  If  that  divinest  of  words  is  true, 
I  get  a  glimpse  of  that  kingdom  whenever  I 
walk  into  Wimbledon. 

To  the  same 

March  10,  1881. 

I  quite  understand  how  (as  you  say)  "a 
mother  loves  those  words  "  which  warn  us  against 
offending  one  of  the  little  ones — but  to  me  the 
divinest  of  all  divine  words  and  thoughts — is 
that  "of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  I 
am  very  sure  it  is  so  here  on  earth — where  nothing 

'  Olive,  niece  of  Mr.  Watts-Dunton. 


132  LETTERS 

— except  age  in  its  brightest  beauty  of  goodness 
and  sweetness  and  kindness — is  so  adorable  as 
a  little  child  is.  At  the  same  time — to  be 
practical  and  candid — I  must  admit  that  it  is 
a  noisy  quarter  of  Paradise  which  is  occasionally 
occupied  when  I  am  (so  to  speak)  admitted  to 
it  by  my  little  Bertie.  If  you  could  but  have 
seen  him  the  last  two  days  that  I  have  been 
reading  and  explaining  Shakespeare  to  him — that 
is,  since  he  has  been  introduced  to  Falstaff! 
Both  his  father  and  mother  tell  me  he  talks  of 
nothing  else — literally  both  day  and  night.  .  .  . 
Again  and  again  during  my  half-reading  half- 
relating  the  main  part  of  the  great  comic  scenes, 
the  child  went  over  on  the  small  (the  very  small !) 
of  his  little  back  among  the  sofa  cushions,  crow- 
ing aloud  like  a  baby,  choking  with  laughter, 
shouting  and  rolling  from  side  to  side  with  his 
heels  any  height  above  his  head  and  kicking 
with  absolute  fury  of  delight.  "Oh!  didn't  he 
tell  stories!"  he  said  to  his  father  (in  the  largest 
type  of  a  child's  voice).  I  thought,  if  Shake- 
speare could  have  been  looking  down  and 
enjoying  the  little  thing's  inexpressible  rap- 
ture, he  must  have  felt  [it  a  greater  tribute 
than  all  the  plaudits  of  all  the  theatres  in  the 
world. 


DEATH  OF  PHILIP  MARSTON  133 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
March    14,    1888. 

.  .  .  Many  thanks  for  your  kind  words  of 
sympathy  about  the  loss  of  my  dear  old  friend 
MrSo  Procter.  She  certainly  was  the  brightest 
old  body  that  ever  laughed  off  her  years — the 
most  brilliantly  witty  woman  I  ever  met.  Many 
people  were  terribly  afraid  of  her  tongue — 
which  certainly  could  say  very  sharp  things  in 
a  very  telling  and  memorable  way:  but  to  me 
she  was  always  more  than  kind.  .  .  . 

I  am  very  glad  you  saw  the  statue  tho'  not 
the  tomb  of  my  beloved  friend  and  leader — I 
may  call  him  so  as  he  was  good  enough  to  reckon 
me  among  his  friends  and  disciples.  I  wish  you 
had  seen  him  living.  His  face  was  indeed  "as 
it  had  been  the  face  of  an  angel." 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Feb.  24,  '87, 


.  .  .  And  now  I  come  to  the  subject  which 
has  been  almost  the  only  thing  I  have  been  able 
to  think  of  for  five  minutes  together  for  the  last 
ten  days.  You  will  have  seen  in  the  AthencEiim 
— if  not  before — the  annoxmcement  of  the  death 


134  LETTERS 

of  my  beloved  friend  Philip  Marston;  his  poor 
father  sent  me  a  note  announcing  it  on  the  very 
day  that  he — as  I  do  hope  and  trust  and  believe 
— ^passed  from  a  life  of  such  suffering  and  sorrow 
as  very  few  can  have  known  to  a  happy  one.  I 
am  sure  you  will  be  as  glad  (or  almost  as  glad) 
as  I  am  to  remember  your  kindness  in  helping 
me,  and  his  good  friend  (imknown  to  me  other- 
wise) Mrs.  Craik,  to  provide  against  risk  of 
want  for  him.  I  don't  know  whether  I  ought 
to  wish  that  you  had  known  him,  because  if  you 
had  you  could  not  help  any  more  than  we  can 
being  very  unhappy  at  the  sense  of  his  loss. 
But  of  course  I  do  feel  it  would  have  been  most 
cruel  and  selfish  and  wicked  even  to  wish  that 
his  life  should  have  been  prolonged — tho'  nobody 
quite  knows  (not  even  Watts,  I  think)  what 
a  pleasure  it  was  to  me  to  have  him  here  and 
talk  to  him  and  read  to  him  and  see  his  poor 
blind  eyes  become  so  expressive  of  pleasure  and 
emotion  that  nothing  but  the  vague  direction 
of  their  look  reminded  one  that  they  could  see 
nothing.  And  I  did  so  want  to  get  him  nearer, 
so  that  I  might  have  seen  him  oftener  and  spent 
more  time  in  reading  to  him.  It  was  so  beauti- 
ful and  interesting  to  see  how  he  enjoyed  being 
read  to.     And  his  affection  and  gratitude  for 


DEATH  OF  PHILIP  MARSTON  135 

such  very  very  little  kindness  as  one  could  show 
him  would  explain — if  you  had  seen  us  together 
— ^why  I  have  been  so  much  more  unhappy  than 
I  ought  to  have  been  at  the  news  of  his  release; 
even  though  his  sorrows  were  such  as  to  make 
one  half  inclined  to  believe  in  the  terrible  old 
superstition  of  an  evil  star.  Think  of  a  child 
bom  with  a  beautiful  gift  of  poetry,  and  a  most 
affectionate  nature,  and  the  most  beautiful  face 
/  ever  saw  in  a  man — ^Watts  was  saying  the 
other  day,  "Though  Philip  was  the  handsomest 
man  I  ever  saw,  one  never  thought  of  calHng 
him  handsome,"  and  I  said,  "No,  he  was  too 
beautifur' — and  so  he  was ;  not  the  least  effem- 
inate, but  in  feature  and  expression  far  above 
such  a  word  as  "handsome" — and  then  think  of 
this  child  struck  blind  in  infancy — and  when  he 
grew  up  being  engaged  to  a  beautiful  yoimg  lady 
who  loved  him  as  he  deserved  to  be  loved,  and 
died  suddenly  just  before  the  time  appointed 
for  their  marriage — and  then  finding  such  com- 
fort as  he  could  in  the  affection  of  a  sister  who 
was  devoted  to  him  and  travelled  with  him 
abroad  and  was  (one  could  see)  as  nice  as  dar- 
ling A.  could  have  been  to  me  under  the  cir- 
cimistances — and  then  losing  her  too!  When  I 
heard  of  that  (I  mean  of  Miss  Eleanor  Marston's 


136  LETTERS 

death)  I  felt  almost  horrified  at  such  an  ac- 
cumulation of  miseries  on  one  poor  fellow's  head 
— and  that  one  so  humble  and  lovable  and 
patient  and  bright  and  brave.  I  can't  help 
wishing  (in  spite  of  what  I  said  before)  that  you 
had  known  him.  Everybody  who  did,  I  am 
quite  sure,  loved  him.  .  .  . 

...  I  have  tried  to  put  a  little  bit  of  my 
affection  and  sorrow  into  some  poems  which 
are  going  to  appear  directly  with  a  memorial 
article  by  Watts  (enlarged  from  his  notice  in 
the  AthencBum  of  Philip's  death — I  was  actu- 
ally going  to  write  "poor  Philip's  death" — 
but,  thank  God,  it  isn't  "poor"  Philip  any 
more  now). 

To  the  same 

The  Pines,  Putney  Hill, 
Oct.  7,  1896. 

Thanks  for  your  kind  words  of  sympathy  with 
Walter  and  me  in  our  sorrow  for  the  great  loss 
we  have  just  undergone  of  one  of  the  best  friends 
we  ever  had,  and  one  of  the  best  men  that  ever 
lived  [W.  Morris] — simple  as  a  child  and  unself- 
ish as  few  children  are,  brave  and  kind  and 
true  and  loyal  as  any  one  of  his  own  Icelandic 


BURNE- JONES'S  DEATH  137 

heroes  or  mediaeval  knights.  As  Walter  has 
been  saying  to  me  this  evening,  it  is  unlike  any- 
other  loss — it  is  like  the  loss  of  a  noble  and 
glorious  child  whose  quaint  charm  of  character 
made  us  half  forget  the  imique  genius  of  the 
poet  and  the  extraordinary  energy  of  the  man. 
My  friendship  with  him  began  in  '57 — think 
of  that! — and  was  never  broken  or  ruffled  for  a 
moment;  tho'  for  many  years  we  have  hardly 
ever  met,  it  was  none  the  less  cordial  and  true. 
I  felt  sttinned  all  the  day  after  his  death.  It 
seemed  incredible.  Walter  says  he  felt  just 
the  same .... 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

The  Pines, 
June  22,  '98. 

The  shock  of  so  great  and  so  utterly  unex- 
pected a  sorrow  as  the  sudden  loss  of  a  beloved 
friend  of  more  than  forty  years'  standing  made 
it  all  but  impossible  for  me  to  write  till  now  to 
anybody,  except  one  line  of  acknowledgment  to 
dear  Ned's  daughter  for  the  note  written  at  her 
mother's  desire  to  let  me  know  of  our  common 
bereavement.  I  literally  could  not  reahze  or 
even   understand   it   till   Walter   explained   the 


138  LETTERS 

truth  to  me,  and  I  saw  the  memorial  article  in 
the  Times  of  that  morning  (Saturday  last — I  feel 
as  if  it  was  months  ago  instead  of  four  days 
since;  dark  and  heavy  days  they  have  been  to 
me). 

I  am  very  glad  you  sent  a  wreath,  and  thank 
you  for  the  honour  done  to  my  verses.  I  hope 
and  think  they  were  rather  appropriate.    .    .    . 


To  his  Youngest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
June  30,  '98. 


I  am  getting  over  the  shock  though  not  the 
sorrow  of  my  great  loss — at  least  I  begin  to 
realize  it,  and  no  longer  find  myself  thinking  of 
Ned  as  alive — or  rather  feeling  half  a  dozen 
times  in  the  day  for  a  second  (less  long  than  a 
flash  of  lightning  lasts)  as  if  he  were,  and  we  were 
sure  to  meet  soon  and  show  each  other  things  and 
enjoy  the  exchange  of  talk  and  fun.  I  have  a 
volume  of  poems  ready  for  the  press  inscribed  to 
his  memory  and  Morris's  in  a  poem  of  the  same 
metre  and  length  as  the  two  former  poems  of 
dedication  addressed  to  each  of  them  respectively 
in  '65  and  '93.  It  was  something  of  a  relief  to 
write  this  third  dedication,  and  something  of  a 
comfort  to  find  how  highly  W.  thinks  of  it .  .  .  . 


MRS.  LYNN  LINTON  139 

To  his  Mother 

The  Pines, 
Nov.  13,  1892. 

I  have  written  some  verses  on  Tennyson's 
beautiful  and  enviable  death  in  the  arms  of 
Shakespeare,  as  one  may  say,  reading  my 
favourite  poem  of  all  just  before  the  end .... 
They  are  in  the  same  metre  as  those  I  wrote  last 
year  on  his  birthday,  with  which  he  was  (as  he 
wrote)  so  much  pleased — and  the  two  poems  are 
just  of  the  same  length. 


To  his  Eldest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
July  26,  '98. 


Perhaps  you  may  know  that  I  have  lost 
another  dear  and  honoured  friend  in  Mrs.  Lynn 
Linton.  It  was  a  great  shock  and  grief  to  me  to 
see  her  death  announced  in  the  newspapers — I 
did  not  even  know  that  she  had  been  ill.  She 
was  not  only  one  of  the  most  brilliant  and  gifted, 
but  one  of  the  kindest  and  most  generous  of 
women.  She  would  give  me  some  priceless 
manuscript  relics  of  Landor — her  spiritual  father, 
whose  best  and  truest  friend  she  was.  I  never 
knew  any  one  more  nobly  upright  and  unselfish 
and  loyal  and  true.     No  one  ever  will. 


I40  LETTERS 

To  his  Youngest  Sister 

The  Pines, 
Sept.  26  [no  year  given]. 

I  ought  to  have  answered  your  letter  of  the  6th 
before  I  received  your  letter  of  the  23d,  but  I 
am  so  dazed  with  proofs  of  the  huge  fourth 
volume  of  my  "Poems,"  that  I  can  hardly  feel 
as  if  I  had  either  eyes  or  brains  left. 

I  am  very  truly  glad  that  you  like  the  lines  on 
the  death  of  my  dear  and  honoured  friend,  Mrs. 
Lynn  Linton,  so  much.  Your  description  of  the 
sea  and  rocks  and  sands  made  me  quite  hungry 
and  envious.  Mr.  Woodford  (in  the  long  pre- 
episcopal  days  when  I  was  his  private  pupil — 
you  remember  him  at  East  Dene?)  used  often 
to  talk  of  Lundy  Island.  He  had  been  tutor 
(before  my  time)  to  the  two  sons  of  its  owner — 
whose  extraordinary  name  was  Heaven.  *  *  Walter 
Heaven"  had  evidently  been  a  favourite  pupil! 
Did  you  see  in  the  Times  Supplement  a  notice  of 
the  memoir  of  my  other  episcopal  "coach,"  the 
future  Bishop  of  Oxford,  and  the  very  pleasant 
and  grateful  mention  of  his  unworthy  pupil?  .  .  . 

I  thought  you  might  like  the  cutting  I  send 
from  the  Daily  Graphic  about  the  return  of  the 
Discovery,   but    I   daresay    you   have   seen   it. 


LEIGHTON  141 

What  a  magnificent  business  it  has  been!  I 
know  how  you  must  have  gloated  and  thrilled 
over  it. 

To  his  Mother 

The  Pines, 
Feb.  24,  1896. 

We  have  both  been  feeling  very  sorry  for  the 
loss  of  poor  Leighton.  There  never  was  a  man 
for  whom — even  on  a  comparatively  slight 
acquaintance — one's  regard  came  so  near  affec- 
tion. To  know  him  was  to  like  him,  and  to  like 
him  was  almost  to  love  him .... 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

The  Pines, 
June  17,  '88. 

...  I  hope  the  place  continues  to  suit  you; 
how  long  have  you  taken  it  for.''  It  is  very  good 
of  you  to  have  chosen  me  a  room,  and  it  will  be 
a  great  pleasure  to  come  and  occupy  it.  I  shall 
always  remember  Leigh  House  with  great  affec- 
tion and  regret.  I  always  liked  it,  but  last 
summer  I  enjoyed  the  neighbourhood  and  my 
favourite  walks  so   thoroughly  that  liking  had 


142  LETTERS 

passed  into  something  like  real  love,  such  as  I 
have  hardly  felt  for  any  place  since  we  left 
East  Dene.   .    .    . 

I  am  very  sorry  the  poor  Emperor  of  Germany 
is  dead,  he  seems  to  have  been  so  really  lovable 
a  man:  but  I  hope  his  son's  hatred  of  his  mother's 
country  is  exaggerated  by  report. 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 
Christmas  Day,  1888. 


I  have  just  sent  to  the  Athenceum  a  poem 
(which  Watts  likes  so  much  that  I  venture  to 
hope  you  may  like  it)  in  memory  of  my  late  dear 
friend  J.  W.  Inchbold — whose  guest  I  was  for 
three  months  or  so  in  Cornwall  in  the  summer 
and  autimm  of  1864 — and  imder  whose  (tempor- 
ary) roof  I  wrote  much  of  the  above-mentioned 
Atalanta.  I  wish  you  had  known  him — he  was 
a  very  religious  man  and  a  strong  Churchman, 
but  most  charitable  and  liberal-minded  (as  you 
may  infer  from  the  cordiality  of  our  friendship) 
to  men  of  different  views  or  leanings.  And  / 
don't  know  where  you  could  beat — or  perhaps 
match — his  finest  studies  of  landscape,  since  the 


/.  W.  INCHBOLD  143 

days  of  Turner.  Indeed  some  of  his  Swiss 
studies  of  lakes  and  mountain-sides  seem  to  me 
quite  worthy  of  Turner  himself  in  many  of  the 
qualities  we  associate  with  the  older  and  more 
famous  painter's  name — and  this  without  any 
touch  of  imitation.  But  now  he  is  gone  one 
thinks  less  of  all  that  than  of  his  inexhaustible 
kindness  and  goodness,  and  his  beautiful  sin- 
cerity and  simplicity  of  character.  He  had  not 
many  friends,  being  very  shy  and  rather  brusque 
in  manner,  so  that  people  were  apt  to  think  him 
odd :  but  you  could  not  come  to  know  him  really 
without  loving  and  honouring  him  truly  and 
deeply.    .    .    . 

To  his  Youngest  Sister 

2,  The  Terrace,  Lancing-on-Sea, 
Midsummer  Day  (Oct.  14),  1888. 

It  is  enough  to  make  a  saint  swear  himself 
black  in  the  face  to  think  of  you  all  detained  in 
London  cold  and  darkness  when  you  might  be 
basking  here  under  a  sky  of  (better  than)  Italian 
sunshine.  This  is  the  tenth  day  of  our  residence 
here,  and  I  have  had  a  dip  and  swim  every  (I 
may  well  say)  blessed  day.  I  am  now  writing 
face  to  face  with  the  moon  (which  is  likeways 


144  LETTERS 

reflected  in  the  water  under  my  window)  by 
the  Hght  of  the  afterglow  of  a  superb  sunset. 
The  sea  has  been  all  day  like  an  immense  pearl 
for  colour,  and  like  nothing  but  itself  for  sweet- 
ness. While  swimming  this  morning,  we  could 
see  every  pebble  and  tuft  of  weed  at  the  bottom 
of  the  water  as  clearly  as  if  the  water  had  been 
air.  But  we  could  not  carry  out  the  project  of 
a  long  walk  for  fear  of  the  heat — and  this  with 
the  wind  in  the  north-east.  At  other  times,  of 
course,  it  is  warmer  still.    .    .    . 

You  may  perhaps  have  heard  of  the  proposed 
alterations  in  Rome  which  would  carry  a  new 
street  over  Keats's  grave — "cut  it  away,"  as 
Ned  Jones  writes  to  me — and  of  course  we  want 
to  enter  a  protest  against  this.  But  who  do  you 
think  has  (in  Ned's  words)  "been  got  at — and 
I  believe  has  promised  his  interest"?  The 
Emperor  of  Germany! 

So,  just  sixty-six  years  ago,  a  stablekeeper's 
son  and  surgeon's  apprentice  died  of  consump- 
tion in  a  strange  land  at  the  age  of  twenty-six, 
and  desired  on  his  deathbed  that  his  epitaph 
should  be,  "Here  lies  one  whose  name  was 
written  in  water."  And  now  the  greatest  of 
European  monarchs  is  practically  interested  in 
the  preservation  of  his  grave. 


BISHOP  OF  ELY'S  DEATH  145 

To  his  Mother 

The  Pines, 
April  5,  1893. 

I  am  thankful  to  begin  another  year  of  my  life 
by  writing  to  you  the  first  words  I  write  in  it. 
You  know  that  I  cannot  say  what  love  I  want  to 
send  you.    .    .    . 

.  .  .  No  less  distinguished  a  person  than 
Miss  Ellen  Terry  has  sent  me  a  very  pretty 
birthday  nosegay,  for  which  I  have  asked  W. 
(a  great  friend  of  hers)  to  convey  my  thanks  to 
her.    .    .    . 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Nov.  9,  1885. 


I  need  not  tell  you  how  sorry  I  was  to  hear 
of  the  death  of  the  Bishop  of  Ely :  nor  that  I  have 
always  retained  and  shall  always  retain  a  sin- 
cerely affectionate  regard  for  him — if  I  do  not 
say  "for  his  memory,"  one  reason  may  be  that 
as  I  grow  older  the  dead  become  so  alive  and  real 
to  me.  I  have  had  dreams  of  my  father  and  of 
Edith  so  vivid  and  delightful  that  they  still  seem 
as  real,  and  almost  as  worth  remembering,  as 
many  actual  recollections.  The  real  loss  of 
friends,  the  insuperable  and  irremediable  separa- 


146  LETTERS 

tion,  is  not,  one  feels  more  and  more  deeply  and 
certainly,  that  which  is  made  by  death, — nor 
yet  by  difference  of  opinion  or  variety  of  forms 
of  faith  and  hope,  but  only  by  real  unworthiness. 
I  am  very  much  gratified  by  what  you  tell  me  of 
the  Bishop's  kind  remembrance  of  me.  I  hope 
you  will  like  my  little  book  on  the  great  and  good 
man  who  always  insisted  so  ardently  and 
earnestly  in  all  his  writings  on  the  certainty  of 
immortality  and  reunion  with  those  we  have 
loved,  and  if  ever  he  became  at  all  unjust,  or 
less  than  charitable — became  so  to  those  who 
denied  or  doubted  this.  (Not  that  I  think 
the  creator  of  Monseigneur  Bienvenu  ever  was 
or  could  have  been  imcharitable:  but  I  have 
sometimes  thought  that  he  and  Mazzini  hardly 
made  allowance  enough  for  good  and  honest  and 
imselfish  men  who  cannot  share  their  faith  in 
personal  immortality.) 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Nov.  25,  1895. 


I  was  sorry  to  see  De  Tabley's  death  in  the 
Times  this  morning.  Walter,  who  knew  him 
well,  is  very  sorry — ^he  liked  him  so  much.  But 
he  was  what   I   should   call  prematurely  old. 


M.  NODIER  147 

When  he  was  here  last  he  said  to  Miss  Watts 
that  Walter  and  I  were  quite  a  pair  of  boys — and 
he  was  just  W.'s  age — two  years  my  elder.  I 
should  really  have  liked  to  see  him  here  again.  .  .  . 

To  the  same 

April  22,  1884. 

....  Last  week  Watts  and  I  went  to  dine 
at  Mrs.  Ritchie's  {jiee  Thackeray — now  staying 
at  Wimbledon  in  a  pretty  old  house  such  as  that 
delicious  old  town  is  full  of)  and  to  meet  Miss 
Rhoda  Broughton — and  (more  especially  on  my 
part  at  least)  to  meet  Mrs.  R.'s  little  children, 
who  are  ducks,  and  very  nice-mannered.  She 
told  me  a  pretty  story  of  one,  to  whom  she  had 
been  reading  The  Rose  and  the  Ring — "How  kind 
it  was  of  Grandpapa  to  write  this  book  for  me!" 
quite  believing  in  its  little  heart  that  its  grand- 
father had  written  the  book  in  its  especial  be- 
hoof so  many  years  before  it  was  dreamt  of.  I 
call  that  very  darling. 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Jan.  18,  1893. 


Is  M.  Nodier  a  descendant  or  relation  of  the 
celebrated    author,    and    collector    of    precious 


148  LETTERS 

books,  M.  Charles  Nodier,  who  was  such  a 
friend  of  two  rising  or  promising  young  men  (in 
1 82 1 -2-3  or  thereabouts  .  .  .)  Alexandre 
Dumas  and  Victor  Hugo?  He  must  have  been 
one  of  the  most  amiable  and  delightful  men  to 
know  that  ever  lived. 

Jan.  29,  1893. 

I  am  very  glad  M.  Nodier  was  so  pleased  with 
my  htmible  note  and  transcript.  Please  tell  him, 
if  you  have  the  opportunity,  how  gratified  I  am, 
not  only  to  have  given  pleasure  to  any  one  who 
had  shown  such  consideration  and  courtesy  to 
you,  but  to  have  been  brought  into  any  relation 
with  the  descendant  and  representative  of  M. 
Charles  Nodier — ^who  .  .  .  has  evidently  be- 
queathed the  best  and  finest  of  his  qualities  to 
his  family — to  one  of  them,  at  least. 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
June  5,  1882. 

To-day  has  been  my  first  free  day  for  a  long 
spell  of  time.  Yesterday  night  I  sent  off  my 
last  proofs,  and  the  biography  (in  MS.)  of  Mary 
Queen  of  Scots :  which  I  shall  be  disappointed  if 


M,  MEAULLE  149 

you  do  not  like  when  you  read  it.  I  have  spared 
no  pains  to  make  it  complete,  fair,  and  pleasant 
to  read  as  well  as  sufficient  for  information. 
After  all  that  has  been  written  about  my  heroine, 
it  is  a  fact  that  there  is  not  even  a  tolerably  good 
memoir  of  her:  but  I  do  think  there  will  be  one, 
when  this  is  in  print ....  I  can  answer  for  its 
carefulness  and  fairness.  I  have  taken  really 
great  and  conscientious  pains  with  it,  comparing 
evidence  and  collating  facts  like  a  lawyer — and 
supplying  all  the  dates  with  most  punctilious 
precision. 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
July  22d  [no  year  given]. 

Yesterday  a  total  stranger,  with  a  letter  of 
introduction,  called  here  to  make  me  a  most 
lovely  present.  M.  Meaulle,  an  eminent  French 
engraver,  brought  me  ...  a  splendid  proof 
set  of  Victor  Hugo's  drawings  which  he  has  lately 
engraved — mostly  studies  of  the  sea  (some  of 
great  beauty  and  power),  of  old  buildings,  of 
strange  places  and  strange  faces,  taken  in  Guern- 
sey, and  generally  illustrative  of  his  Travail- 
eiirs  de  la  Mer. 


150  LETTERS 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
Dec.  5,  1892. 

I  have  made  the  acquaintance  of  a  neighbour, 
Lady  Brooke  (the  Sarawak  Rajah  Brookes) 
whom  Mrs.  Ritchie  (nee  Thackeray)  brought  to 
call  on  me,  with  a  petition  that  I  would  visit  her 
poor  bedridden  boy  who  was  longing  to  have  a 
nearer  sight  of  me  than  out  of  window  (I  pass 
their  house  twice  each  morning  on  my  way  to 
and  from  Wimbledon).  So  of  course  I  went — 
and  fell  in  love  with  the  poor  boy,  who  is  evi- 
dently what  his  poor  mother  describes  him — the 
bravest  and  most  patient  and  bright -tempered 
young  fellow  that  ever  was  laid  on  his  back  for 
months  if  not  years  at  the  fidgety  age  of  16  or 
thereabouts.  She  says  I  ''have  done  him  more 
good  than  one  thousand  doctors"  (I  have  half  a 
mind  to  send  you  her  letter  of  thanks  to  me — it  is 
very  touching)  but  they  (doctors)  hope  he  will 
get  round  at  last.  I  have  called  twice  since,  with 
books  to  amuse  him — and  have  managed  not  to 
cry  in  his  presence,  though  thinking  of  him  and 
his  gratitude  and  pleasure  (at  sight  of  me)  has 
more  than  once  made  my  eyes  smart  and  moisten 
in  private. 


SIR  WALTER  SCOTT  151 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
Jan.  4,  1891. 

If  you  don't  know  the  legend  of  Ticonderoga, 
I  think  you  will  be  as  much  excited  by  it  as  I, 
who  consider  it  one  of  the  very  best  supernatural 
stories  on  record,  and  not  badly  told  this  time  in 
verse.  I  also  like  the  close  of  the  last  poem, 
Christmas  at  Sea — and  the  Pacific  Island  stories 
are  at  all  events  new  and  curious.  .  .  .  This 
winter  has  deprived  me  of  two  very  old  and  very 
dear  friends,  whom  I  had  known,  the  one  ever 
since  1858,  the  other  ever  since  1861 — William 
Bell  Scott  and  Richard  Burton.  The  death  of 
the  latter  you  will  of  course  have  seen  in  all  the 
papers ;  the  former  passed  away  quietly  some  few 
weeks  since  at  Penskill  Castle  in  Ayrshire,  of 
which  you  may  remember  his  beautiful  drawings, 
engraved  in  one  of  his  volumes  of  poems .... 

Did  I  mention  in  a  former  letter  that  I  was 
writing  an  article  on  Sir  Walter  Scott,  a  propos 
of  his  newly  published  Diary,  which  has  so  many 
fresh  and  interesting  passages  not  given  in 
Lockhart's  Life?  It  will  cost  a  deal  of  time  and 
toil  to  make  it  what  I  hope  it  will  be,  but  W. 
speaks  very  kindly — and  highly — of  it  as  far  as 
I  have  got — about  a  quarter  of  the  whole  book. 


152  LETTERS 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
June  i8th  [year  undated]. 

I  have  begun  a  new  book  (in  prose)  of  studies 
in  English  Poetry  consisting  of  short  notes  and 
summary  critical  remarks  on  all  our  chief  writers 
in  that  line  and  a  good  many  of  the  best  among 
the  lesser  and  less  famous.  I  have  done  with 
Milton  and  begun  with  Dryden  (having  started 
from  Chaucer).  Watts  praises  both  the  design 
and  (thus  far)  the  performance  to  the  skies — in 
terms  which  I  will  not  quote  lest  you  should  be 
reminded  of  the  glowing  praises  recorded  by 
Mrs.  Gamp  as  having  so  "frequent"  been  be- 
stowed on  her  by  Mrs.  Harris.  Nichol,  who, 
though  much  overwhelmed  just  now  by  literary 
work  (he  is  writing  a  new  critical  memoir  of 
Byron),  has  just  made  us  a  week's  visit  .  .  . 
found  time  to  hear  and  warmly  applauded  the 
pages  on  Milton,  in  which  I  have  pitched  into 
Puritanism  and  the  selfish  ambition  and  stupid 
shortsightedness  of  Cromwell  in  a  way  of  which 
you,  I  think,  will  not  disapprove,  though  a  good 
many  others  will,  as  it  goes  heavily  against  the 
present  fashion  of  blind  and  parrot-like  Crom- 
well-worship, set  first  on  foot  by  that  hoary 
villain  Carlyle. 


"ON  A  CHILD''  153 

Before  ending,  I  must  copy  out  for  you  a  little 
poem  by  an  old  Church  poet  of  Elizabeth's  time 
— ^the  Revd.  Thomas  Bastard — whose  book 
(dated  1598)  has  just  been  reprinted  by  my  good 
friend  Dr.  Grosart  (I  spare  you  the  old  spelling). 

ON  A  CHILD  JUST  BEGINNING  TO  TALK 

Methinks  'tis  pretty  sport  to  hear  a  child 
Rocking  a  word  in  mouth  yet  undefiled. 
The  tender  racket  rudely  plays  the  sound, 
Which,  weakly  bandied,  cannot  back  rebound, 
And  the  soft  air  the  softer  roof  doth  kiss. 
With  a  sweet  dying  and  a  pretty  miss. 
Which  hears  no  answer  yet  from  the  white  rank 
Of  teeth  not  risen  from  their  coral  bank. 
The  alphabet  is  searched  for  letters  soft, 
To  try  a  word  before  it  can  be  wrought. 
And  when  it  slideth  forth,  it  goes  as  nice^ 
As  when  a  man  doth  walk  upon  the  ice. 

I  hope  you  think  this  as  delicious  a  description 
of  a  baby  "cutting  its  first  words"  (as  one  may 
say,  instead  of  teeth)  as  both  Watts  and  I  do. 
The  simile  from  the  old  game  of  rackets  or 
tennis-play,  is  very  sweet  to  me.  .  .  .  And 
the  "pretty  miss"  (not  Young  Person  of  the 
Female  Sex)  is  such  a  pretty  phrase,  I  think,  for 
a  sweet  failure  to  make  itself  understood  by 
hitting  upon  the  right  articrdation .... 

*  Daintily,  or  carefully. 


154  LETTERS 

My  excuse  [for  not  answering  a  letter]  must  be 
that  I  have  yoked  myself  again  for  a  moment  to 
the  car  of  the  Encyclopcedia  Britannica,  and  have 
been  working  my  best  and  hardest  at  a  critical 
and  biographical  article  on  Landor,  which  having 
now  despatched,  I  have  begun  another  on  Mar- 
lowe.   .    .    . 

Like  Watts  and  the  rest  of  the  reading  world, 
I  have  been  greatly  disgusted  by  the  sour  ar- 
rogance, egotism,  and  malevolence  of  Carlyle's 
Reminiscences — but  now  I  can  understand  and 
excuse  the  ugly  display  of  those  amiable  qualities. 
It  appears  that  most  of  the  book  was  written  at 
Mentone.  No  temper,  no  character,  could  be 
expected  to  remain  tolerable  under  the  influ- 
ence of  that  hateful  hole — ^much  less  those 
of  a  dyspeptic,  half  heart-broken,  childless, 
and  recent  widower  past  eighty.  But,  all 
the  same,  the  book  is  about  the  nastiest 
in  tone  and  temper,  that  ever  I  read.  I  am 
so  glad  to  remember  that  the  two  things  this 
old  man  of  genius,  who  hated  almost  every- 
thing and  reviled  almost  everybody,  hated 
and  reviled  above  all  others,  were  poetry  and 
republicanism.  I  wish  the  prose  royalists  joy 
of  their  champion — I  rather  prefer  Victor  Hugo 
myself. 


VISIT  TO  MR.  JOWETT  AT  OXFORD     155 
To  the  same 

Ball.  Coll., 
Thursday,  Dec.  7,  '71. 

Many  thanks  for  your  letter,  and  for  sending 
on  the  letters  enclosed.  It  has  been  very  cold 
here,  but  very  fine,  and  not  (as  I  yesterday  ex- 
pected) snowy.  Jowett  says  it  is  weather  to  be 
grateful  for,  and  certainly  considering  how  misty 
it  often  is  here  we  may  be  thankful  for  such  clear 
fresh  days.  I  have  met  several  of  the  present 
generation  of  undergraduates,  and  it  is  interest- 
ing to  notice  Jowett 's  own  unfailing  interest  in 
them,  their  characters  and  prospects.  He  has  so 
large  a  power  of  sympathy  with  yoimg  men  and 
such  a  clear  intelligence  of  their  wants  and  views 
and  aims  that  you  feel  more  and  more  his  fitness 
for  the  place  he  holds  and  the  secret  of  his  broad 
and  deep  interest  in  it. 

I  am  happy  to  note  a  steady  progress  in  the 
University  of  sound  and  thorough  Republican 
feeling  among  the  younger  fellows  of  colleges  as 
well  as  the  undergraduates.  A  Fellow  of  Wad- 
ham  is  secretary  of  a  Republican  Club  just  estab- 
lished here;  and  under  these  circumstances  I 
find  my  position  and  influence  properly  recog- 
nized— "which  is  also  very  soothing."  (I  am 
writing  with  Jowett's  pens  and  paper  and   in 


156  LETTERS 

consequence  as  scratchily  and  uncomfortably  as 
he  does — no  wonder  he  hates  having  to  write  a 
short  note  or  letter  as  much  as  I  do.)  He  (Jow- 
ett)  and  I  are  going  up  to  London  by  the  5  P.  M. 
train  to-day.  He  only  told  me  he  was  going 
yesterday:  so  like  him — "just  like  Roger."  I 
shall  make  but  a  short  stay,  but  there  are  some 
things  I  must  do  and  some  people  I  must  see: 
after  which  I  hope  to  settle  down  at  Holmwood 
till  my  next  visit  hither,  as  I  expect  J.  will  re- 
invite  me  next  (Easter)  term. 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
Nov.  2,  1893. 

I  took  great  pains  with  that  little  article,  and 
it  is  most  comfortable  and  encouraging  to  know 
that  you  think  so  well  of  my  prose,  which  is  so 
much  harder  to  write  than  verse  that  I  am  pro- 
portionately elated  by  such  very  kind  praise  of 
it.  I  only  hope  (honestly  and  unaffectedly) 
that  it  is  not  too  kind! 

But  anyhow  I  trust  you  will  like  and  be  in- 
terested by  another  sample  which  I  hope  to  be 
able  to  send  you  (in  the  same  form  of  proof 
sheets)  sometime  this  month.     It   is  the   first 


^ 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  MR.  JOWETT       157 

time  I  ever  attempted  anj^thing  of  the  sort,  and 
Walter  says  most  satisfactory  things  of  my  suc- 
cess— and  he  ought  to  know,  having  written 
such  admirable  records  of  his  friends — George 
Borrow,  poor  Rossetti,  and  Tennyson.  You  will 
perhaps  anticipate  that  I  have  been  writing  down 
some  recollections  of  Mr.  Jowett — not  forgetting 
his  visit  to  Holmwood  and  his  enjoyment  of  a 
reading  from  Dickens  which  I  hope  you  have  not 
forgotten.  W.  has  written  some  beautiful  son- 
nets in  commemoration  of  our  stay  with  him  at 
Boar's  Hill  and  walks  to  and  from  Oxford — and 
he  said  I  ought  to  write  something  about  such  a 
friend.  So  I  thought  I  wouldn't  try  to  versify 
my  feelings,  but  would  just  write  down  some 
records  of  our  intercourse — especially  as  all  the 
accounts  and  estimates  and  reminiscences  of  Mr. 
Jowett  (which  are  probably  numerous  and 
voluminous  enough  already)  deal  only  with  his 
relations  to  Oxford,  and  I  could  tell — and  have 
told — what  sort  of  a  man  he  was  away  from 
Oxford.  I  think  you  will  say  it  is  done  with  the 
right  sort  of  taste  and  feeling,  and  I  hope  you 
will  be  interested  by  my  tribute  to  the  memory  of 
so  good  and  true  and  tried  a  friend. 


158  LETTERS 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
Dec.  9,  1893. 

I  am  very  glad  my  article  on  Jowett  was  found 
interesting — I  hoped  you  would  like  it.  At  first 
it  was  very  favourably  received — "but  alas!" 
quoth  Mr.  Gladstone's  organ,  the  Daily  News, 
"it  is  all  about  Mr.  Swinburne,  and  not  about 
Mr.  Jowett."  (As  Walter  said,  I  had  simply 
effaced  myself — said  the  least  I  possibly  could 
about  A.  C.  S.  and  abstained  from  telling  one  or 
two  anecdotes  worth  record,  because  I  should 
have  had  to  bring  in  my  own  name.)  And  the 
Saturday  Review  "never  met  with  anything  so 
ill-bred  in  our  time."  Of  the  two,  the  Tory  is 
more  insolent,  as  you  see,  than  the  Radical ! 

,  [The  following  letter  of  a  somewhat  earlier  date 
describes  the  settling  into  the  house  which  be- 
came his  home  for  life.] 

To  the  same 


The  Pines,  Putney  Hill, 
Sept.  27,  1879, 


You  will  see  that  our  flitting  has  been  in  the 


HALLIWELL-PHILLIPPS  159 

main  accomplished — into  a  large  double  block 
of  building,  of  which  we  inhabit  the  left  house 
(looked  at  from  the  street)  till  the  right — our 
own  domicile — is  ready.  Meantime  we  are 
gipsying  here  with  furniture  enough  for  sleep, 
meals,  and  a  sitting-room.  .  .  .  Each  house 
also  has  a  little  "tower"  at  top  to  which  one  gets 
by  ladders  ...  off  one  fiat  of  leads  on  to 
another,  whence  the  view  is  really  very  nice. 
The  part  we  live  in,  as  we  all  agree,  is 
exactly  like  the  outlying  (and  prettiest) 
parts  of  Oxford,  where  there  are  (or  were) 
little  gardens  with  large  trees  overhanging 
them  and  little  old  walls  round  a  "grass- 
plat."  And  we  are  within  an  easy  walk  of 
Richmond  Park,  in  which  I  have  already  made 
two  longish  excursions — and  also  within  less 
than  an  hour  of  Piccadilly — and  no  under- 
ground travelling!   .    .    . 

I  send  you  to  look  at  (please  return  it  when  you 
write)  a  very  nice  letter  from  poor  old  Mr.  Halli- 
well-Phillipps  in  reply  to  one  proposing  (not 
"asking  leave"  according  to  the  detestable  and 
too  usual  formula)  to  dedicate  my  forthcoming 
book  to  him  as  one  of  the  men  who  have  done 
most  service  of  the  best  kind  to  all  students  of 
Shakespeare. 


i6o  LETTERS 

[In  February,  1889,  he  had  his  bust  taken, 
which  is  now  in  the  Eton  Museum.     He  writes :] 

I  have  been  (not  sitting  but)  standing  for  my 
portrait  in  the  shape  of  a  bust — to-morrow  is  to 
finish  it.  It  is  not  half  so  tiring  as  being  painted 
— but  of  course  I  shall  be  glad  when  it's  over. 
Walter  says  the  likeness  is  wonderful — and 
I  think  it  must  be,  for  I  can't  look  at  it  without 
laughing,  it  is  so  absurdly  like  my  reflection  in 
the  glass,  made  solid.  But  I  hope  you  won't 
think  it  very  conceited  or  presumptuous  of  me 
if  I  say  that  I  could  not  help  being  struck  by  its 
likeness  to  my  father.  I  don't  think  it  can  be 
my  fancy,  because  W.  and  the  sculptor  both  said 
the  same  after  comparing  his  photograph  with 
the  cast  of  my  bust.  I  need  not  say  how  glad 
and  proud  I  was — need  I? 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
March  7,  1889. 


I  should  have  thanked  you  before  for  your  last 
very  kind  and  precious  letter,  but  I  have  been 
swamped  (so  to  speak)  in  a  sea  of  proofs,  of 
which  I  send  you  the  last  (duplicate)  as  I  think 
you  may  perhaps  recognize  the  locality  of  the 


SWINBURNE'S  BUST  i6i 

little  poem.'  The  last  walk  I  took  last  year 
from  Lancing  to  Shoreham  was  by  the  sands, 
and  the  sea  was  so  far  out  and  the  shore  slopes 
so  much  that  even  the  tops  of  the  downs  were 
out  of  sight  behind  the  low  sea-bank  which  shut 
out  everything  on  shore.  It  was  wonderfully 
lonely  and  striking. 

My  bust  is  thought  a  very  good  likeness ;  it  is 
by  a  yoimg  German  sculptor  named  Dressier, 
who  is  also  making  a  bust  of  Wm.  Morris — who 
(he  says)  is  as  bad  a  sitter  as  I  am  a  good  one. 
Indeed  though  it  was  tiring  to  stand  so  long,  it 
was  much  less  wearisome  than  sitting  for  one's 
portrait.  It  is  not  a  commission,  but  done  (as 
you  say)  "for  his  own  fame."   .    .    . 

Even  I,  who  honestly  and  truly  like  cold 
weather,  have  felt  it  now  unpleasantly  sharp  and 
raw.  The  pools  on  the  common  were  a  most 
curious  and  beautiful  sight  a  few  days  since.  The 
snow  had  melted  from  the  land  about  them, 
leaving  only  a  thin  frostwork  on  the  banks,  but 
still  lay  so  deep  and  thick  and  fleecy  on  the  ice 
that  each  little  lake  looked  like  a  round  or  a 
square  snowfield  framed  in  a  rough  setting  of 
brown  and  grey.  You  can't  think  how  strange 
and  lovely  it  was. 

'  The  poem  is  Neap-Tide. 


1 62  LETTERS 

[A  little  undated  scrap,  cut  from  a  letter,  tells 
how.] 

I  have  had  a  letter  from  Italy  which  gives  me 
great  pleasure  for  two  reasons.  ( i )  It  shows  that 
the  Italians  are  so  loyal  and  true — so  grateful  to 
foreigners  who  really  love  Italy.  (2)  They  have 
found  out  (which  is  more  than  we,  his  country- 
men, have)  that  they  ought  to  raise  a  national 
monimient  to  the  memory  of  Shelley.  And  they 
do  me  the  honour  to  say — in  very  complimentary 
and  gratifying  terms — that  "of  course "  my  name 
was  "unanimously  acclaimed"  "a  far  parte  del 
comitato  d'onore  pel  monumento. ' '  I  am  awfully 
glad  .  .  .  and  I  wrote  a  pretty  letter  of  thanks 
in  the  best  Italian  I  can  manage. 

[Another  (undated)  letter,  probably  of  1879, 
tells  of  the  first  coming  into  the  household 
of  the  little  child  whose  presence  made  such  a 
marvellous  difference  to  the  poet's  life  during 
the  greater  part  of  his  sojoiun  at  Putney.] 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 

Nov.  nth. 


And  now  we  have  got  my  small  friend,  Watts's 
little  five-year-old  nephew,  with  his  mother  and 


BERTIE  MASON  163 

an  aunt  (begging  their  pardon  for  bringing  them 
in  by  way  of  appendages  to  the  Hkes  of  him); 
and  he  is  a  sweet  thing  in  infants.  I  gave  him  a 
big  box  of  preserved  fruits  from  Fortnum  and 
Mason's,  and  the  child's  dehght  (tho'  he  Hkes 
^^ some  of  them"  very  much)  is  to  give  the  nicest 
away  right  and  left  to  all  the  members  of  the 
household  including  myself.  ...  I  am  grieved 
to  add  that  being  very  tired  this  morning  he  was 
rather  less  good  than  gold  at  luncheon  where 
there  was  nobody  else  but  his  aunt  and  I  (who 
am  not  good  at  inspiring  awe  and  enforcing 
obedience — which  well  they  knows  it  at  first 
sight,  and  behaves  themselves  according).  How- 
ever, after  he  had  had  a  sleep  he  came  down  as 
bright  and  well-behaved  as  ever,  and  has  be- 
stowed on  me  two  really  lovely  presents,  a 
highly  elaborate  match-box,  and  a  penholder 
which  is  also  a  pencil  at  the  other  end.  It  makes 
such  a  pleasant  difference  having  a  child  in  the 
household  to  rule  over  you,  and  make  every- 
thing bright  about  him — even  if  he  does  so  far 
forget  the  whole  duty  of  man  and  the  dignity  of 
his  years  as  to  behave  at  luncheon  in  imitation  of 
certain  animals  at  the  Zoological  Gardens  who 
make  faces  over  their  food — which  is  very  shock- 
ing and  painful  to  think  of ...    . 


i64  LETTERS 

We  have  not  yet  moved  into  our  own  house, 
but  it  is  getting  well  on. 

[From  this  time  onward  the  letters  to  his 
family  are  full  of  the  sayings  and  doings  of 
"Bertie,"  from  infancy  to  schoolboy -hood.  I 
select  one  or  two  for  quotation,  as  showing  his 
extreme  love  and  tenderness  for  children.] 

To  the  same 

The  Pines  and  cetrer, 
Feb.  22,  1881. 

I  must  begin  my  letter  for  once  with  a  tiny 
poem  written  yesterday  in  the  same  hour  that  the 
little  thing  said  this  strangest  and  prettiest  word 
ever  spoken  in  my  hearing  by  any  child.  We 
were  looking  at  my  Pictorial  Shakespeare,  and 
came  upon  the  old  woodcut  reproduced  in  so 
many  books  from  some  religious  MS.  of  the  time 
of  Edward  III.,  representing  a  very  fine  young 
man  with  curls  and  turned-up  shoes,  &c.,  &c., 
meeting  Death  beside  an  open  grave  at  noonday 
face  to  face.  Death  is  not  a  vulgar  skeleton,  but 
a  very  lean,  tall  man  partly  draped  with  a  loose 
cloak  thrown  about  him:  very  impressive,  but 
not  disgusting  or  frightening. 


BERTIE  MASON  165 

Looking  in  a  book  where  stood 
Carved  of  old  on  old-world  wood 
Death,  and  by  the  grave\s  edge  grim, 
Pale,  the  young  man  facing  him, 
Straight  the  child  most  loved  of  me 
Asked  what  strange  thing  this  might  be, 
Gaunt  and  great  of  limb? 

Death,  I  told  him;  and,  surprise 
Deepening  more  his  wildwood  eyes 
(Like  a  sweet  swift  thing's  whose  breath 
Spring  in  green  groves  nourisheth), 
Up  he  turned  his  rosebright  face 
Glorious  with  its  seven  years'  grace. 
Asking— "What  is  death?" 

I  had  written  so  far  after  he  left  me  and  was 
going  to  write  more  when  I  was  interrupted ;  and 
on  showing  the  lines  to  Watts  after  dinner,  he 
exhorted  me  to  leave  off  there  .  .  .  and  though 
I  might  write  ever  such  fine  lines  to  follow  it 
would  impair  the  perfection  of  the  effect  or 
impression  produced  by  ending  with  Bertie's 
own  three  words.  Did  you  ever  hear  sweeter 
ones — or  stranger? 


To  his  Eldest  Sister 


The  Pines, 

Mar.  29,  '86. 


....   Poor  dear  Bertie  has  been  laid  up  in  bed 
very  ill  ever  since  Thursday  with  a  damp  door- 


1 66  LETTERS 

step  settled  on  his  lungs — or  at  least  some  damp 
affecting  those  poor  little  organs  and  stopping 
up  his  throat — so  that  we  have  been  in  distress 
about  him,  though  as  of  course  you  see  by  my 
tone  we  have  not  been  in  apprehension  of  danger 
— but  it  seems  to  me  much  more  than  a  week 
(tho'  they  say  it  is  really  but  four  or  five  days) 
since  I  saw  my  darling.  Which  I  know  I  could 
miss  him  almost  as  well  as  Betsy  Prig.  .  .  . 
They  all  say  he  is  getting  round ;  but  it  has  been 
a  serious  trouble;  and  the  child  is  so  very  gentle 
and  patient  when  out  of  his  usual  sorts  that — 
especially  in  such  a  hardy  and  sturdy  little  fellow 
— it  is  very  touching.  He  just  comes  and  sits 
into  the  same  armchair  with  me  and  puts  his 
Httle  arm  about  my  neck  and  rests  his  little  head 
on  my  breast  or  shoulder.  It  is  all  I  can  do  to 
remember  that  he  is  imcomfortable  and  not  re- 
joice in  having  him  again  on  the  old  terms .... 

To  the  same 

2,  The  Terrace,  Lancing-on-Sea, 

NR.  Worthing,  Nov.,  '87. 

I  was  just  thinking  about  my  next  letter  to 
you,  and  the  many  pleasant  things  I  had  to  put 
into  it,  when  your  letter  announcing  poor  H.'s' 

'  A  cousin. 


LANCING-ON-SEA  167 

death  came  and  changed — of  course — the  tone 
of  my  intended  letter.     I  need  not  say  how  sorry 

I  am  for  poor  Aunt  E .     I  could  not  say  it,  if 

I  were  to  try.  ...  As  for  the  poor  fellow 
himself,  no  one  who  has  any  trust  in  a  future  and 
better  life — as  I  have — can  imagine  that  the 
change  is  not  a  blessing  far  beyond  any  poor 
human  words  or  fancies.  What  you  tell  me 
about  his  love  of  his  profession,  and  the  noble 
tribute  to  his  character  given  by  his  comrades, 
is  so  beautiful  that  it  would  be  profane  to  call  it 
pathetic.  .  .  .  And  now  I  have  so  much  to 
write  to  you  in  praise  of  this  glorious  country 
that  I  believe  I  shall  never  get  through  half  of 
what  I  have  to  say  at  a  sitting.  And  if  what  I  do 
say  should  be  mis-timed  or  troublesome — if  you 
are  too  busy  about  sadder  and  more  serious 
things  to  care  for  my  raptures  about  Sussex — 
please  put  this  letter  aside  for  the  present:  and 
anyhow  please  don't  think  it  unfeeling  of  me  to 
talk  about  scenery  when  I  have  been  for  days 
brooding  on  the  description  I  meant  to  try  and 
send  you.  It  will  be  wretchedly  inadequate, 
I  know:  but  I  also  know  you  would  enjoy  the 
view,  if  I  could  transport  you  to  the  outskirts  of 
the  little  copse  or  spinney  perched  on  the  highest 
point  of  the  seaside  downs  in  this  part  of  the 


i68  LETTERS 

county.  I  think  it  is  the  most  glorious  view  I 
ever  saw.  Watts  and  I  were  going  up  the  lower 
part  of  the  nearest  down,  after  having  passed 
the  fine  old  church  (of  Lancing)  and  some 
beautiful  wooded  country,  when  he  said  how  nice 
he  thought  it  would  be  to  build  a  house  in  a  curve 
of  the  high  open  down  above  us  to  the  right.  I 
thought  it  would  be  lovely  but  rather  bleak — ^the 
hillside  being  perfectly  treeless  and  shrubless  and 
open  to  every  wind  (no  shelter  inland  for  ever 
so  far) — and  said  that  on  the  whole,  when  he  had 
built  his  farm  there,  I  would  not  keep  house  with 
him  in  the  winter.  Before  we  had  gone  half  a 
mile  higher  (I  should  think)  I,  who  was  ahead, 
saw  a  fine  old  farmhouse  built  in  the  very  spot — 
the  exact  part  of  the  higher  down — that  he  had 
chosen  for  his  homestead,  seeing  it  only  from 
below.  And  when  I  saw  it,  I  saw — and  told  him 
— how  right  he  had  been  and  how  wrong  I  had 
been.  But  when  I  reached  the  top  of  the  steep 
ascent  above,  it  would  have  been  my  turn  to 
crow.  It  is  the  highest  point  of  the  seaboard  for 
many  miles,  and  wherever  one  goes,  east  or  west, 
one  sees  the  above-mentioned  little  spinney  or 
copse  of  thin,  lank,  rather  scrubby  trees,  which 
crowns  it.  Behind  this  the  downs  sweep  away 
inland,  melting  into  each  other  and  rising  and 


LANCING-ON-SEA  169 

falling  and  swelling  and  sinking  like  waves  of  a 
greater  sea,  caught  and  fixed  in  the  act  of  motion 
— nothing  but  the  infinite  range  of  softly-rounded 
heights  to  be  seen  to  left  or  right  when  you  look 
northward;  but  turning  east  you  see  Shoreham 
with  its  broad  estuary  lying  (as  it  seems)  quite 
near  at  hand,  but  looking  a  tiny  village.  Then, 
going  round  behind  the  copse  and  a  little  way 
down  and  up  again,  you  come  out  upon  the  brow 
of  the  down  to  westward,  after  passing  through 
a  broad  grassy  way  cut  crosswise  (+)  through  a 
great  wilderness  of  whin — and  there  (as  afore- 
said) is  the  most  glorious  view,  without  exception, 
that  I  ever  set  eyes  on.  Miles  upon  miles  upon 
miles  of  woodland  and  meadow  and  hillside,  farm 
and  village  and  town — Worthing,  with  its  noble 
pier,  and  all  the  country  beyond  and  about  it — at 
such  a  distance  below  that  you  then  first  realize 
how  high  the  point  of  view  must  be.  And 
always  beyond  all,  and  glorifying  all  the  scene 
with  its  own  incomparable  glory  of  loveliness, 
the  sea. 

Another  day  we  went  over  Shoreham  Church 
(or  cathedral,  as  I  always  feel  inclined  to  call  it) 
and  agreed  that  we  had  never  seen  a  more  beauti- 
ful or  a  grander  building.  Some  of  it  is  of  the 
very    oldest     Norman — eleventh    century — and 


170  LETTERS 

even  to  my  ignorant  eyes  as  impressive  as  if  I 
knew  something  about  architecture.  They  have 
stuck  in  a  modem  altar  and  east  window,  glar- 
ing and  garish  and  quite  out  of  keeping  with  the 
beautiful  old  arches  of  the  aisles  on  either  side. 
Another  sea-gull  (besides  myself)  had  got  in  and 
was  flying  up  and  down  in  much  bewilderment; 
I  hope  it  got  out  at  last,  but  I  don't  know.  I  go 
almost  every  day  to  look  up  at  the  church  and 
walk  around  it;  I  don't  think  I  ever  was  so  fas- 
cinated by  the  majesty  and  beauty  of  any  build- 
ing. I  enjoy  it  almost  as  much  as  the  landscape 
— or  as  if  it  were  a  thing  of  natural  beauty — and 
I  hardly  ever  have  felt  that  about  a  mere  work 
of  httman  hands.  But — for  that  matter — ^what 
superhtiman  hands  some  of  those  old  builders 
have  had! 

I  had  much  to  say  about  a  natural  product  of 
the  neighbourhood — the  Shoreham  infant — but 
I  have  no  room  left  to  inflict  more  chatter  on  you. 
I  must,  however,  observe  that  the  Shoreham 
infant,  boy  or  girl,  as  soon  as  it  can  toddle,  as- 
simies  a  nautical  swagger  or  rolling  walk  which 
would  upset  the  gravity  of  a  bishop  or  a  judge — 
that  it  always  claims  the  upper  hand  of  the 
Shoreham  adult,  and  is  always  made  way  for  as  it 
struts  along  the  crown  of  the  causeway,  morally 


WORTHING  171 

shoving  its  elders  into  the  gutter,  before  it  can 
well  stand — and  that  it  would  be  enough  of 
itself  to  make  its  native  town  worth  a  visit. 

To  the  same 

2,  The  Terrace,  Lancing-on-Sea, 
NR.  Worthing, 
Nov.  3,  1887. 

You  will  see  by  the  newspapers  that  the  gale 
of  the  day  before  yesterday  was  such  as  comes 
but  once  in  twenty  years.  .  .  .  When  I 
mention  that  the  sea  was  breaking  right  on  to  the 
Worthing  road  and  sending  sheets  or  fountains  of 
spray  full  across  it,  I  need  hardly  mention  what 
route  I  selected  that  day  for  my  morning  walk. 
It  was  impossible  to  stand  upright  without  some 
sort  of  support,  so  that  when  there  was  no  wall  or 
railing  to  the  leeward  one  had  to  duck  and  dodge 
or  crawl  forward  with  bent  back  in  the  most 
absurd  way.  Never  did  you  see  a  sweeter  sight 
than  the  great  esplanade  at  Worthing  when  at 
last — in  the  shape  and  likeness  of  a  drowned  rat 
— I  got  there.  It  was  covered  with  all  manner  of 
sea-drift — large  stones  and  bits  of  iron,  masses  of 
seaweed,  all  sorts  of  odds  and  ends.  Yesterday 
morning  there  were  men  at  work  pretty  nearly 
all  the  way  clearing  and  repairing  the  road  as  far 


172  LETTERS 

as  possible.  There  was  also  the  brightest  and 
most  perfect  though  by  no  means  the  largest 
rainbow  I  ever  saw.  And  on  the  esplanade,  at 
a  corner  where  the  day  before  the  strongest  men 
could  not  stand  upright  without  clutching  hold 
of  some  support,  there  were  groups  of  little 
children  (one  tiny  girl  as  lovely  as  an  angel  or  a 
baby)  looking  down  on  the  brown  and  yellow 
waves  that  were  breaking  just  below,  with  intent 
and  intense  delight.  I  went  along  the  pier 
(which  would  not  have  been  a  very  advisable 
expenditure  of  energy  the  day  before)  and  ex- 
amined the  sea  and  the  coast  with  my  "marine" 
glass.  The  colour  of  the  sea,  I  must  confess,  was 
hideous — London  mud  and  London  fog  mixed — 
but  it  was  still  rolling  and  heaving  deliciously. 
My  favourite  afternoon  walk  (I  generally  take 
two  in  this  divine  salt  air,  daily)  is  to  Shoreham, 
our  nearest  neighbouring  town  eastward,  as 
Worthing  is  westward.  It  is  one  of  the  quaintest 
and  strangest  places  I  ever  saw;  an  inland  town 
which  at  certain  hours  of  the  day,  from  certain 
points  of  view  inside  it,  is  apparently  on  the 
very  edge  of  the  sea — ^whereas  really  the  nearest 
way  to  the  shore  (in  spite  of  the  town's  name)  is 
a  full — I  should  say  a  long — mile.  It  has  a 
hideous  semi-attached  suburb   (more  properly, 


SHOREHAM  173 

two  semi-detached  ones)  with  railway  station, 
great  wharves,  and  what  they  call  "timber 
ponds"  (we  neither  of  us  ever  saw  or  heard  of 
such  a  term  for  timber-yards  before — did  you?) 
stretching  along  the  windings  of  an  immense 
estuary — large  enough  to  have  splendid  ships 
moored  up  on  its  muddy  banks,  which  one  may 
walk  about  and  examine  without  trespassing 
(which  is  forbidden)  on  the  main  wharf.  .  .  . 
At  high  tide  the  sea  comes  more  than  a  mile  up, 
and  floods  the  mudbanks  so  gloriously  that  if  you 
see  it  (you  don't  see  them)  at  high  tide,  it  looks 
as  if  the  town  was  really  built  on  a  long  deep 
broad  creek  or  channel  of  the  sea:  whereas  it 
isn't  at  all.  The  real  town  lies  away  from  all  this, 
with  one  old  winding  main  street  going  quietly 
through  it  from  quiet  meadowland  into  quiet 
copses  and  downs.  Its  glory,  as  perhaps  you 
know,  is  its  old  church.  I  am  afraid  you  would 
think  I  was  romancing  if  I  tried  to  tell  you  how 
beautiful  and  impressive  it  is.  I  never  saw  a 
cathedral  which  fascinated  me  so  much.  Every 
day,  when  I  go  into  the  town,  I  go  to  look  at  it, 
and  usually  to  walk  round  it,  as  the  churchyard 
is  open  at  all  its  wickets  (there  are  so  many,  and 
it  is  so  large,  that  one  day  I  missed  the  gate  I 
ought  to  have  come  out  by,  and  found  myself  in 


174  LETTERS 

an  unknown,  unlovely,  and  bewildering  part  of 
the  town — from  which,  after  many  wanderings, 
I  could  only  extricate  myself  by  going  back  into 
the  churchyard  and  round  the  church  till  I  found 
which  was  the  west  gate). — I  have  stopped  at  this 
point,  trying  to  hit  on  the  right  words  to  describe 
to  you  some  of  its  (the  church's)  beauties,  but  I 
am  so  ignorant  of  architecture  that  I  don't  know 
how  to  begin.  There  are  no  end  of  buttresses, 
and  niches  with  three  short  pillars  in  them  (I 
don't  the  least  know  what  for,  but  I  suppose  just 
to  be  lovely),  and  window-arches  wrought  and 
carved  as  if  to  give  one  a  peep  into  heaven — and 
all  the  divine  building  looks  more  as  if  it  had 
grown  than  as  if  it  had  been  built.  And  our  own 
countrymen  go  on  raving  about  foreign  churches, 
from  Rouen  to  Rome!  I  am  sure  you  would 
agree  with  me  that  nothing  could  beat  this — 
one  of  the  glories  of  your  county.  I  do  really 
begin  to  think  that  Sussex  is  worthy  to  be  your 
county;  and  I  can't  well  say  more  for  it  than 
that. 

The  Duke  of  Norfolk  who  was  duke  in  1832 
(Bernard  'Ed-ward  Howard  was  his  grace's 
name — ^what  ears  his  sponsors  must  have  had!) 
built  a  suspension  bridge  over  the  river  at  the 
western  entrance  of  the  town,  just  where  the 


SHOREHAM  175 

river  becomes  an  arm  of  the  sea,  which  is  almost 
as  great  a  deHght  to  me  to  cross  twice  daily  as 
it  might  be  if  I  were  a  blessed  chick.  Beneath 
it  on  each  side  there  are  squares  of  shallow  water 
full  of  soft,  green  weed,  set  in  little  frames  of 
green  with  tiny  paths  along  the  four  sides  which 
just  let  one  walk  on  one  foot  at  a  time  about  or 
between  them — and  these  are  oyster-beds.  One 
day  as  I  was  returning  from  Shoreham  at  sunset 
the  whole  glory  of  a  most  wonderful  evening 
sky  was  reflected — and  almost  improved — in 
these  tiny  quiet  pools  or  lakelets,  twelve  if  not 
twenty  times  over.  It  was  like  seeing  a  number 
of  water-colour  drawings  (I  did  not  mean  a  pun, 
really  and  truly)  by  Turner  set  in  frames  of 
bright  green,  lovelier  and  more  appropriate  than 
gold. 


P.  S. — I  forgot  to  state  that  the  architect 
employed  by  his  dear  good  grace  of  Norfolk  has 
put  on  the  top  of  two  arches  which  dignify  the 
"Norfolk  Bridge"  a  horse,  which  is  too  palpably 
a  rocking-horse,  and  a  lion  which  has  too  ob- 
viously come  out  of  a  Noah's  Ark.  We  call 
them  the  gee-gee  and  the  poodle. 


176  LETTERS 

To  the  same 

c/o  Mr.  Jermy, 

Mill  House,  Sidestrand,  Norwich, 

Sept.  1 8,  1883. 

Yesterday  we  left  the  metropolitan  splendours 
of  Cromer  for  the  delicious  little  refuge  from 
whence  I  write  to  thank  you  for  your  letter  of 
the  13th  from  Sidmouth.  ...  I  waited  till  we 
were  settled  here  to  write,  as  it  would  have  been 
useless  dating  from  the  Bath  Hotel  which  we 
only  stayed  in  till  good  Mr.  Jermy,  the  miller  of 
this  tiny  old  village,  was  able  to  receive  us  as 
lodgers.  On  entering  I  find  an  envelope  directed 
to  me,  left  by  the  outgoing  tenant  to  be  delivered 
immediately  on  my  arrival,  and  containing  a 
copy  of  verses  of  a  most  fervent  and  flowery 
description,  adjuring  me  to  confer  fame  upon  this 
lonely  country — which  verses  I  find  to  be  the 
production  of  the  author  (name  imknown)  of  the 
very  article  in  the  Daily  Telegraph  which  sent  us 
hither.  It  appeared  on  Aug.  30th  under  the 
highly  "aesthetic"  title  of  "Poppy-land,"  and 
on  my  showing  it  to  Watts  and  saying,  "This 
must  really  be  a  delicious  sort  of  place,  in  spite  of 
this  worthy  man's  florid  style  of  cockney  enthu- 
siasm,"  he  set  his  heart  on  coming  here  in  case 
the  weather  were  suitable;  and  it  has  been  very 


SIDESTRAND  177 

favourable  hitherto.  But  is  it  not  funny  we 
should  have  got  into  the  very  house  occupied  till 
last  evening  by  the  man  who  had  unconsciously 
induced  us  to  come  into  the  country?  We  are 
quite  near  Cromer — about  3  or  4  miles  at  most, 
though  our  own  post-town  is  Norwich — and  we 
get  last  night's  papers  here  between  9  and  10 
A.M. — it  is  now  just  io>^.  The  whole  place  is 
fragrant  with  old-fashioned  flowers,  sweet-wil- 
liam and  thyme  and  lavender  and  mignonette 
and  splendid  with  great  sun-flowers.  We  have 
bathed  once  or  twice — the  sea  is  much  better 
than  at  Southwold. 

[In  another  letter  he  speaks  of — ] 

.  .  .  these  good  people  [his  hosts  at  Side- 
strand]  seeing  a  notice  somewhere  of  my  sonnet 
("Near  Cromer")  in  Home  Chimes,  and  sending 
for  that  magazine  on  the  strength  of  this  notice 
and  taking  it  in  ever  since.  I  told  Miss  Jermy 
this  morning  that  I  had  written  a  poem  about 
their  garden  here  which  was  now  in  the  printer's 
hands,  and  she  said  with  the  quaintest  sim- 
plicity, "O,  sir,  how  good  of  you — how  very 
kind!" 


178  LETTERS 

To  his  Mother 


Mill  House, 

sidestrand,  norwich, 

Sept.  17,  1884. 


The  day  before  the  day  before  yesterday, 
some  friends  of  Watts's  now  staying  at  Cromer, 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Grant  Allen,  called  on  us,  accom- 
panied by  their  son,  a  gentleman  aged  between 
half -past  five  and  a  quarter  to  six:  who  had 
expressed  a  wish  to  see  me  because  he  was  so  fond 
of  some  of  my  verses !  There — after  that,  don't 
let  anybody  talk  to  me !  The  chick,  when  I  was 
presented  to  him,  was  rather  shy  at  first,  but 
presently  allowed  me  to  lift  him  on  to  a  chair, 
to  look  at  some  very  astonishing  coloured  prints 
on  the  wall;  and  on  my  enquiring  if  he  liked 
maps,  replied  "Yes!"  with  an  energy  worthy 
of  the  son  of  a  distinguished  scientific  writer  like 
his  father.  So — having  got  him  in  my  arms — I 
carried  him  comfortably  into  the  room  where  I 
am  now  writing,  and  pointed  out  to  him  this 
tiny  village  or  hamlet  of  Sidestrand  on  the  map 
against  the  wall :  whereat  there  was  an  exclama- 
tion of  delight  and  wonder,  and  a  look  of  expan- 
sive interest  in  two  of  the  largest  and  darkest 
blue  eyes  that  ever  saw  five  birthdays.     There 


SIDESTRAND  179 

is  no  doubt  that  this  is  a  wonderfully  fine  air  for 
children.  Such  a  picture  of  health  and  sweet- 
ness and  brightness  you  do  not  see  every  day — 
if  you  did,  this  poor  earth  would  he  "the  kingdom 
of  heaven."  ...  It  will  surprise  and  indeed 
astonish  you  to  learn  that  we  parted  the  best  of 
friends,  with  an  engagement  to  meet  again,  which 
I  hope  will  be  soon  kept!  Really  I  don't  know 
what  to  do  with  myself  for  pride  and  pleasure 
at  the  notion  of  a  little  child  Hking  any  of  my 
verses  so  much  as  to  want  to  see  the  writer,  and 
to  invite  itself  (as  one  may  say)  from  Cromer  to 
Sidestrand  for  that  purpose. 


To  his  Eldest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
Dec.  II,  '87. 


...  I  never  did  pine  and  weary  after  a 
"paradise  lost"  as  I  do  after  this  Sussex  sea- 
board— never  for  many  a  year;  I  thought  I  had 
outgrown  such  longings.  But  I  have  been  yearn- 
ing after  my  daily  walk — and  frequent  dip — like 
a  boy  parted  from  his  home.  There  is  one  walk 
I  dream  of  night  and  day,  which  I  first  explored 
on  a  dark  night  after  the  sun  had  set,  reflecting 
that  it  never  could  seem  so  wild  and  strange  by 
day ....     The  road  I  was  telling  you  of  runs 


1 80  LETTERS 

from  nowhere  to  nowhere,  and  is  so  lonely,  with 
a  vast  stretch  of  fen  or  pastureland  on  either  side, 
that  to  be  alone  there  in  the  dark  without  even 
starlight  and  with  a  wild  wind  blowing  was  like 
a  dream — and  simply  delicious.  I  never  had  a 
nicer  walk;  and  then  on  returning  by  day  with  a 
good  glass,  one  had  a  magnificent  view  of  the 
high  downs  with  precipitous  sides  eastward 
beyond  Shoreham  closing  in  all  the  east  side  of 
the  horizon  as  the  other  range  closes  in  all  the 
north  side — W.  the  fields  or  fens  sweeping  away 
to  Lancing — and  southward  the  green  sea-banks 
shutting  out  the  beach — but  you  feel  the  sea  in 
the  air  at  every  step.  ...  But  what  you  should 
see  is  the  estuary  when  the  tide  is  coming  up  with 
a  high  wind,  miles  inland.  The  sea  is  of  course 
far  out  of  sight,  and  standing  on  the  old  bridge 
you  see  a  broad  brown  yellow  river  gone  de- 
mented and  running  the  wrong  way,  inland  and 
uphill,  with  all  its  might — all  the  imnatural 
might  of  madness.  It  is  too  queer  to  see  it  rush- 
ing up  among  the  woods  between  the  downs, 
boiling  and  surging  almost  like  the  outer  sea. 
The  tide  flows  and  ebbs  for  miles  inland  above 
Shoreham.  That  is  something  like  a  country! 
and  I  am 

Ever  your  most  affectionate  brother. 


SHOREHAM  i8i 

To  the  same 

2,  The  Terrace  [Lancing], 
Nov.  II,  '89. 

.  .  .  And  now  I  am  going  to  be  egotistic 
and  trouble  you — who  have  so  many  other 
things  to  think  of — with  a  few  words  on  my 
"experience  of  hfe"  here  just  now.  W.  and  I 
had  a  most  lovely  walk  (I  had  discovered  it) 
yesterday,  halfway  across  the  water-meadows 
to  Shoreham  and  then  up  by  a  road  (on  this  side 
of  the  Sussex  Pad)  on  to  the  very  highest  point 
of  the  downs,  which  we  used  to  reach  by  a  not 
so  very  short  steep  climb:  and  this  was  W.'s 
favourite  walk  (all  these  three  years)  till  now, 
when  he  admits  that  I  have  found  a  better  way 
(I  should  think  it  was !  you  are  at  the  top  before 
you  know  where  you  are). 

I  don't  say  I  fear  it  is  useless — I  know  it  is — 
for  me  to  try  once  more  to  point  out  that  there 
can  be  no  climate  so  good  for  nurslings  and  foster- 
lings of  the  English  Channel — like  every  one  of 
us — as  that  of  the  said  E.  C.  It's  all  very  well, 
but  if  you  came  down  here  (I  don't  mean  liter- 
ally to  Lancing)  and  gave  the  climate  as  fair  a 
trial  as  you  do  the  climate  of  these  foreign  places 
that  fashionable  doctors  bring  into  fashion,  I 


i82  LETTERS 

cannot  imagine  that  you  would  not  find  it  whole- 
somer  and  sweeter  than  any  other  air  in  the  world. 
.  .  .  You  would  want  to  get  acclimatized: 
but  when  you  were  you  would  know  that  Eng- 
land was  meant  for  English  folk,  and  was  whole- 
somer  than  any  other  country.  Not  only  when 
the  S.  W.  wind  is  hurling  our  waves  here  in  shore: 
to-day  it  has  been  a  sharp,  steady  east  wind — due 
east — and  I  have  had  a  most  delicious  swim  (not 
a  very  long  one,  of  course,  alas!).  And  yester- 
day, after  our  long  walk  that  took  up  all  the 
morning,  of  course  I  had  to  get  my  plunge  at 
4  P.M.  or  thereabouts,  just  before  the  sun  took 
its  plunge  behind  a  great  blue-black  rampart  of 
cloud.  I  saw  I  could  only  be  just  in  time — ^and 
I  ran  like  a  boy,  tore  off  my  clothes,  and  hurled 
myself  into  the  water.  'And  it  was  but  for  a  few 
minutes — ^but  I  was  in  Heaven!  The  whole  sea 
was  literally  golden  as  well  as  green — it  was 
liquid  and  living  sunlight  in  which  one  lived  and 
moved  and  had  one's  being.  And  to  feel  that 
in  deep  water  is  to  feel — as  long  as  one  is  swim- 
ming out,  if  only  a  minute  or  two — as  if  one  was 
in  another  world  of  life,  and  one  far  more  glorious 
than  even  Dante  ever  dreamed  of  in  his  Para- 
dise. (Poor  great  man,  he  only  knew  the  Med- 
iterranean!    And  I  dare  say  he  couldn't  swim.) 


SHOREHAM  183 

It  is  a  comfort  to  know  that  you  don't  mind 
being  written  to  on  foolscap,  because  I'm  at  an 
end  of  my  note-paper,  and  am  not  going  to  leave 
off  without  relating  a  little  anecdote.  ...  I 
was  coming  out  of  Shoreham  (having  taken  my 
usual  walk  round  the  church)  when  two  young 
ladies,  who,  if  one  had  been  standing  on  the 
other's  shoulders  (had  that  been  possible)  might 
have  reached  a  little  higher  than  my  knee, 
stopped  me  on  the  highway,  and  silently  but 
resolutely  refused  to  let  me  pass.  I  could  but 
stoop — humbly — and  ask  what  I  was  wanted  for. 
"Hayp'ny, "  said  one  precious  pet.  "But  I 
haven't  a  half-penny  in  my  pocket — I've  only 
got  pennies,"  said  I.  A  penny  would  do,  to 
divide  between  them,  I  was  given  to  understand. 
But  I  thought  not,  and  gave  each  a  penny — and 
a  kiss.  So  far,  you  will  say,  the  story  is  not 
worth  telling.  But  when  I  was  walking  briskly 
on  I  heard  a  sharp  patter  of  little  feet  behind 
me,  and  stopped,  and  saw  these  tiny  chicks  trot- 
ting as  hard  as  they  could  to  catch  me  up. 
What  was  it  now,  I  asked,  laughing.  "Want  to 
kiss  you,"  said  the  (very  slightly)  taller  one.  I 
needn't  say  whether  or  not  I  squatted  down  and 
opened  my  arms ;  and  first  one  and  then  the  other 
put  her  bits  of  arms  up  to  my  neck,  and  kissed 


i84  LETTERS 

me  so  affectionately  that  I  felt  once  more  how 
much  too  good  little  children  are  to  us,  and  then 
went  trotting  back  to  Shoreham.    .    .    . 

To  his  Mother 

Friday,  Oct.  25,  1888. 
2,  The  Terrace,  Lancing-on-Sea. 

As  I  was  returning  from  Shoreham  the  day 
you  left,  there  was  the  most  wonderful  pageant 
of  clouds,  an  hour  before  sunset — or  less,  that 
I  ever  saw;  a  great  part  of  the  western  sky 
covered  with  what  looked  like  immense  but  most 
delicate  and  elaborate  patterns  of  the  finest  old 
lace-work;  tracery  of  dark  and  bright  grey  too 
intricate  to  follow,  but  magically  harmonious 
and  faultless:  then,  from  south  to  north,  an 
infinite  range  of  low  columns  or  pillars,  some 
erect  against  the  bright  background,  some  bent 
aslant,  some  bowed  and  broken — reminding  me 
of  the  basalt  pillars  on  the  mountain-side  in 
Auvergne  that  I  once  tried  to  describe  to  you. 
As  I  said  to  W.,  Turner  might  have  painted  and 
Shelley  might  have  described  that  sky,  but  no 
one  else  could.  The  weather  is  still  so  splendid 
that  I  have  been  twice  in  the  sea  to-day  and  feel 
much  the  better  for  my  second  plunge — the  wind 


SARK  185 

being  now  S.  W.  I  am  so  very  glad  and  thankful 
that  you  feel  the  better  and  not  the  worse  for 
your  too  short  excursion,  and  that  you  are  as 
much  impressed  as  I  am  by  the  wonderful  gran- 
deur and  beauty  of  my  "cathedral. "  I  go  there 
almost  every  day,  just  to  walk  round  it  and  (as 
you  say)  to  give  thanks  for  it,  and  the  day  before 
yesterday  I  actually  found  out  a  new  point  of 
view  (N.  W.)  from  which  I  saw  a  fresh  beauty  in 
it  almost  finer  than  one  sees  from  due  west. 


To  the  same 

Victoria  Hotel,  Guernsey, 
May  15th.' 

Between  Saturday  morning  when  I  wrote  last 
and  Monday  evening  when  I  write  now  from  the 
same  place  but  on  different  paper,  etc.,  I  have 
seen  on  the  whole  the  loveliest  and  wonderfullest 
thing  I  ever  saw — the  island  of  Sark.  Nichol 
and  I  went  off  at  ^j4  in  a  sailing  boat,  and  after 
endless  doublings  and  backings  and  shiftings  of 
sail  we  dodged  with  our  little  boat  in  sideways 
between  a  crevice  in  the  cliffs  at  6}4,  and  found 
ourselves  in  a  little  harbour,  with  a  breakwater 

'  I  have  no  means  of  dating  this  letter.  The  writing  belongs  to  an 
earlier  period  than  the  preceding  extracts. — (Ed.) 


186  LETTERS 

in  miniature,  landed — passed  through  a  huge 
tunnel  of  arched  rock — and  were  in  front  of  a 
road  winding  up  between  two  hills  blazing  with 
furze  and  all  kinds  of  spring  flowers,  by  which  we 
walked  up  over  hills  and  downs  and  tiny  villages, 
through  meadows  and  orchards  in  immeasurable 
variety  of  flower  to  the  hotel  whither  we  had  lost 
our  way — but  in  an  island  rather  imder  five  miles 
long  by  i^  broad  it  is  not  easy  to  wander  very 
far  from  the  straight  road.  There  are  superb 
precipices,  hollow  gullies,  caves  and  tunnels  of 
sea-rock,  headlands  and  staircases  of  crag,  and 
one  awful  pit  which  the  tide  enters  at  flood  but 
into  which  you  can  look  down  at  top  from  the 
summit  almost  of  the  cliff  or  side  wall  of  the 
down:  among  all  which  we  had  a  day  and  a  half 
of  the  best  scrambling  I  ever  had  in  my  life.  I 
must  go  back,  for  there  is  one  path  I  have  neither 
climbed  up  nor  down.  I  have  not  been  in  the 
sea — and  we  could  not  enter  or  even  see  into  the 
great  and  famous  cave  of  all,  which  only  showed 
itself  once  a  fortnight  at  extreme  low  tide:  and 
of  course  not  yesterday  or  this  morning.  These 
are  omissions  that  must  be  repaired.  But  as  for 
the  famous  Coupee  or  passage  over  the  narrow  ( !) 
ledge  of  road  between  two  edges  of  cliff,  it  is  too 
absurd  to  talk  of.     Very  lovely  and  very  high — 


SARK  187 

but  having  expected  a  place  where  we  should  be 
unable  to  walk  abreast,  we  both  burst  out  laugh- 
ing when  we  came  upon  a  bit  of  road  where  (as  I 
observed)  one  might  drive — if  one  knew  how  to 
drive — a  tandem  right  over,  with  perfect  ease 
and  comfort,  and  on  one  side  could  quite  easily 
have  climbed  down  to  the  sea  and  up  again. 
The  lies  of  guide-books!  They  write  as  if  two 
could  hardly  pass,  and  from  five  to  six  even  might 
walk  across  abreast.  But  everywhere  the  glory 
of  flowers,  and  splendour  of  crags  and  cliffs  and 
sea  defy  all  words.   .    .    . 

[The  following  letter  records  a  much  later 
visit.] 

To  the  same 

Hotel  du  Gouffre,  Guernsey, 
Sept.  6,  1882. 

You  will  see  that  our  project,  annotmced  in  my 
last  letter,  is  thus  far  very  successfully  carried 
out,  that  Watts  and  I  have  found  shelter  for  a 
day  or  two  before  we  go  to  Sark — otherwise  Cerg, 
according  to  the  newest  light.  I  hope  this  will 
find  you  all  well,  though  it  will  not  be  possible 
for  me  to  hear  from  you  for  a  fortnight  or  three 
weeks,  as  we  shall  be  constantly  on  the  move  till 


1 88  LETTERS 

our  return  home.  For  my  own  part  I  feel  as  if 
I  would  almost  be  content  to  live  and  die  where 
we  are.  Watts  .  .  .  sends  you  one  of  the 
photographs  enclosed,  and  I  send  the  other. 
But  nothing  can  express  the  beauty  and  sub- 
limity of  this  wonderful  island;  certainly  no 
photograph  can,  much  less  any  words  of  mine. 
On  landing,  after  a  night  passage  during  which  I 
was  more  nearly  frozen  than  ever  before  in  all 
my  days,  having  brought  no  wraps  and  being  as 
usual  quite  unable  to  sleep  in  the  cabin,  I  had  the 
bitter  disappointment  of  finding  that  the  papers 
which  announced  Victor  Hugo's  presence  in  the 
island  had  misled  my  confiding  mind,  as  he  has 
not  come  back  to  his  beautiful  house  and  garden 
in  Peterport,  the  capital  of  the  aforesaid  island, 
for  the  last  three  years.  This  was  a  bad  begin- 
ning— and  the  next  thing  was  that  Watts  must 
needs  go  out  by  himself  on  the  rocks  after  sunset 
without  me  to  look  after  him,  and  all  but  break 
his  left  arm  with  a  fall  on  the  slippery  seaweed- 
covered  surface  of  them,  so  that  he  can  only  swim 
with  one  arm,  which  I  find  by  trying  can  be  done 
for  a  little  bit,  but  is  not  satisfactory  in  propor- 
tion to  the  fatigue.  But  he  says  I  may  say  it  is 
getting  better,  though  it  looks  a  very  ugly  bruise. 
He  also  says  the  scenery  reminds  him  of  Switzer- 


SARK  189 

land  plus  the  sea.  But  I  don't  believe  any  in- 
land scenery  can  be  one  half  as  grand  or  as  lovely. 
The  house  we  are  lodging  in  is  a  little  to  the  right 
of  the  "  GouflPre  "  photograph,  nestled  in  a  cleft  of 
the  rocks.  It  is  very  clean  and  comfortable  in 
a  homely  way,  which  is  more  than  can  be  said 
for  the  Peterport  hotels.  We  are  going  to  Sark 
in  a  day  or  two,  but  I  shall  be  very  sorry  to  leave 
— even  for  my  beloved  "Cerg" — this  lovely 
place,  to  which  (after  seeing  it  in  an  excursion) 
I  proposed  that  we  should  adjoin;  and  we  are 
both  rejoicing  that  we  did  so.  We  had  the  most 
delicious  swim  this  morning  in  a  bay  walled  in 
with  precipices,  and  one  little  cleft  for  the  road 
down  between  them — you  never  saw  or  dreamed 
of  anything  so  lovely.  I  would  settle  here  if  I 
could  give  up  all  company,  and  if  the  air  were 
more  bracing  and  less  warm  and  relaxing — I  was 
almost  faint  with  the  heat,  even  in  this  Arctic 
summer,  before  we  got  down  to  the  bathing- 
place,  though  there  was  not  a  glimpse  of  sun. 
.  .  .  There  never  were  such  sea- views  as  here. 
One  is  sometimes  reminded  of  the  Undercliff, 
but  with  all  my  love  and  gratitude  towards  our 
old  home-country,  I  must  allow  that  this  is  far 
grander.  I  meant  to  have  written  or  tried  to 
write  you  a  fuller  and  better  account  of  some  at 


190  LETTERS 

least  among  the  glorious  scenes  we  are  in  the 
midst  of — but  no  prose  or  verse  except  Victor 
Hugo's  could  give  you  even  a  faint  notion  of  the 
island  which  will  always  be  associated  with  his 
name.    .    .    . 

[The  two  following  foreign  letters  have  no 
year  date,  but  from  references  in  them  I  should 
place  them  in  1869.] 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

H6tel  de  France,  Vichy, 
Aug.  loth. 

I  send  you  some  flowers  gathered  yesterday 
on  the  top  of  a  moimtain  five  thousand  feet 
above  the  level  of  the  sea — ^the  Puy  de  D6me, 
which  Burton  and  I  scaled  and  found  ourselves 
at  the  summit  wrapt  in  a  rolling  and  rushing  sea 
of  mist — very  favourable  of  course  to  the  chance 
of  a  prospect.  However  we  got  it  lower  down 
on  coming  again  into  sunlight,  thanks  to  his 
glasses  for  taking  measurements  and  longitudes 
and  other  professional  and  scientific  things. 
The  view  of  the  Auvergne  country  was  splendid 
and  singular — a  barren  and  broken  land  so 
laboriously  cultivated  that  not  an  inch  was  left 
waste,  and  the  whole  stretch  of  it  from  left  to 


PUY  DE  DOME  191 

right  looked  like  a  carpet  of  many  colours — vine- 
yard, cornfield,  woods,  etc.  From  that  height 
the  land  which,  as  we  passed  through  it  in  our 
drive  upwards,  to  the  foot  of  the  mountain,  we 
had  found  steep,  hilly,  and  irregular,  seemed  a 
dead  level  of  plain.  The  mountain  is  clothed 
with  heather,  but  this  that  I  send  you  is  the  only 
bit  of  white  I  found.  Eastward  from  the  highest 
peak  of  the  range  (where  I  gathered  these), 
stretches  a  long  series  of  volcanic  hills,  cones  and 
craters  alternating.  One  crater  which  we  went 
to  examine  is  now  the  image  of  a  Roman 
amphitheatre,  only  wanting  gladiators  and  lions. 
It  has  got  itself  covered  with  grass  and  worn  into 
numberless  round  rocks  from  bottom  to  top  of 
the  sloping  sides  by  the  feet  of  the  cattle  who 
come  there  to  browze :  and  these  give  it  the  exact 
look  of  a  theatre  with  rising  rows  of  seats. 
Burton,  who  has  made  a  study  of  volcanoes  in 
all  parts  of  the  world,  tells  me  that  this  is  in  one 
thing  about  the  most  extraordinary  of  volcanic 
ranges — the  highest  peak  (Puy  de  Dome — 
"puy"  is  Auvergnat  for  height  or  peak)  is  not 
volcanic :  the  lava  has  not  taken  effect  there,  but 
baffled,  has  burst  out  again  and  again  along  the 
whole  range  of  mountains  extending  east  be- 
neath it  in  a  vast  volcanic  chain.     The  crater 


192  LETTERS 

we  examined  is  called  from  its  look  the  Nid  de 
Povile. 

Clermont-Ferrand,  the  neighbouring  town 
where  we  have  been  for  the  last  two  days,  is  most 
beautifully  planted  among  its  mountains,  and 
has  a  cathedral  which  is  simply  one  of  the  finest 
I  ever  saw.  The  altar  is  of  copper  gilt,  mar- 
vellously carved  all  over  into  figures  and  flowers ; 
date  thirteenth  century,  so  you  will  know  how 
exquisite  and  noble  the  style  is.  I  am  not  sure 
that  I  ever  saw  such  magnificent  windows;  the 
variety  and  harmony  of  coloiirs  is  miraculous 
to  our  poor  modern  eyes.  I  have  got  for  you 
others,  three  photographs — one  larger  and  two 
less — of  the  front  porch  with  its  sculptures  and 
spires.  When  we  came  in  sight  of  it  we  both 
broke  out  in  one  cry  of  admiration :  it  is  so  rich 
and  various,  so  simply  noble  and  dignified,  with 
all  its  wealth  and  exuberance  of  ornament.  There 
are  two  drawbacks:  the  cathedral  is  much  too 
short  for  its  great  height,  so  as  to  seem  tnmcated 
or  cut  off  short  to  one  looking  down  from  the 
high  altar,  and  it  is  so  hemmed  in  and  pushed 
upon  and  barricaded  by  the  shops  and  houses  of 
the  neighbouring  streets,  that  you  can  only  see 
in  full  one  side  of  it,  the  back,  which  is  not 
worthy  of  the  glorious  front. 


VICHY  193 

This  place  is  doing  me  great  good — I  was 
rather  spent  with  the  heat  in  London  (alas!  my 
business  there  with  books  and  publishers  is  not 
yet  over!)  and  now  Burton  says  he  never  yet  saw 
me  so  fresh  and  well ....  Coming  here  from 
Paris  on  a  broiling  day  with  my  back  to  the 
engine,  I  got  to  feel  as  sick  as  anything,  and  you 
cannot  think  how  kind  and  careful  of  me  he  was. 
I  feel  now  as  if  I  knew  for  the  first  time  what  it 
was  to  have  an  elder  brother.  He  is  the  most 
cordial,  helpful,  sympathetic  friend  to  me  it  is 
possible  to  have:  and  it  is  a  treat  at  last  to  have 
him  to  myself  instead  of  having  as  in  London  to 
share  him  with  all  the  world  and  his  wife  and 
children,  from  Lords  Clarendon  and  Stanley  to 
Col.  This  and  Capt.  That.  I  rather  grudge 
Mrs.  Burton's  arrival  here  on  Monday,  though 
we  are  excellent  friends,  and  I  dare  say  I  shall 
see  none  the  less  of  him.  (That  reminds  me  that 
we  had  both  at  once  the  same  idea  in  our  ascent 
of  the  Puy  de  Dome — ^lie  began  gathering  flowers 
to  press  for  her  and  send  by  post,  as  I  did  for  you ; 
but  he  got  no  white  heather.  There  were  bil- 
berries all  the  way  up — very  Mounces-like.) 
We  stay  about  a  week  after  her  coming  to  get 
through  our  course  here — which  is  making  him 
(not  mc,  thank  goodness)  so  fat. 


194  LETTERS 

To  his  Mother 

The  Pines, 
June  20,  1890. 

How  wrong  of to  get  lumbago!     I   .    .    . 

have  had  flying  pains  of  the  sort  lately  (have  a 
shadowy  touch  of  it  while  I  write  these  words) 
but  can  always  walk  them  down — drive  off  the 
pain  by  bullying  it  with  exercise.  Many  a  day 
I  have  gone  up  this  hill  aching  afresh  at  every 
step,  and  walked  into  Wimbledon,  and  home 
again  as  comfortable  as  Bertie — ^who  is  the  ideal 
of  health  and  strength.  There's  one  comfort — 
between  ourselves — that  towering  athlete  who 
looks  down,  physically,  on  his  uncle  and  me,  is 
not  above  sweetmeats — any  more  than  I  am. 
Crisp  gingerbread,  and  small  biscuits  with 
currants  in  them,  when  brought  out  from  Wim- 
bledon in  my  coat  pockets  (as  they  have  been 
this  day,  correctly  packed  and  of  course  in  paper 
bags)  are  as  acceptable  to  Sixteen  as  they  would 
have  been  to  Six.  What  a  privilege  it  is  to  have 
known  a  child  as  intimately  as  possible  from  the 
one  age  to  the  other,  and  not  only  to  have  won 
and  obtained  his  regard  (I  don't  want  to  brag, 
and  say  "his  affection,"  though  perhaps  I  might), 
but  to  be  told  by  his  mother  and  his  guardian 


MARY  QUEEN  OF  SCOTS  195 

that  I  have  drawn  him  on — coaxed  him  so  to 
say — ^to  enjoy  and  understand  what,  thanks  to 
you,  my  darhng  mother,  /  did  when  a  little  boy 
— Shakespeare  and  Moliere  as  far  as  yoimg  boys 
can  or  ought  to  understand  them — and  that  is 
most  of  the  way — ^and  Scott  and  Dickens  alto- 
gether. 

To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
March  18,  1882. 


And  now  I  must  come  down  from  more  impor- 
tant and  interesting  matters  to  my  own  personal 
affairs,  which  have  been  waiting  all  this  time, 
though  5  or  6  days  ago  I  very  nearly  began  a 
letter  about  them  to  you  in  sheer  self-satis- 
faction. I  have  this  week  received,  as  I  con- 
sider, by  far  the  highest  compliment  ever  paid 
me  in  my  life.  The  Editor  of  the  Encyclopcddia 
Britannica  has  asked  me  to  undertake  the  article 
on  Mary  Queen  of  Scots  which  is  to  appear  in 
the  next  volume.  Out  of  all  the  great  historical 
"authorities"  and  "distinctions,"  all  the  special- 
ists and  scholars  in  the  country,  who  might 
have  been — and  might  have  expected  to  be — 


196  LETTERS 

asked  to  undertake  it — for  of  course  there  is 
no  man  to  whom  it  would  not  be  a  great  compli- 
ment— it  is  I,  a  mere  poet,  and  therefore  (as 
most  worthy  folk  would  infer)  a  naturally  feather- 
headed  and  untrustworthy  sort  of  person,  who 
am  selected  to  undertake  such  a  responsibility 
and  assume  such  an  authority  as  a  biographer 
and  historian,  simply  on  the  ground  of  my  pre- 
vious publications  on  the  subject  which  are  taken 
as  warrants  of  my  industry  and  research,  fairness 
and  accuracy.  I  do  not  pretend  to  disguise  the 
fact  that  I  am  really  gratified  and  indeed  rather 
elated  at  such  a  tribute  to  my  conscientiousness 
and  carefulness,  if  nothing  else. 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Oct.  25  [1880]. 


Jowett  came  here  to  luncheon  the  other  day 
...  I  read  him  a  translation  I  have  made  of  a 
very  famous  Greek  poem — the  "  Grand  Chorus  of 
Birds,"  in  a  play  of  Aristophanes  called  the  Birds 
— which  a  day  or  two  before  I  had  done  into 
English  word  for  word  almost,  and  literally 
line  for  line,  in  exactly  the  same  metre  as  the 
original,  only  adding  rhymes  throughout — which 


ARISTOPHANES'  "BIRDS"  197 

is  considered  no  small  feat.  I  read  the  poem 
just  before  leaving  Eton — Mr.  Joynes  set  it  me 
to  read  out  of  school  hours — and  I  always 
thought  it  what  it  is,  one  of  the  very  finest  things 
ever  done  in  the  world.  And  I  have  always 
fancied  or  dreamed  how  nice  but  how  impossible 
it  would  be  to  give  an  idea  or  an  echo  of  it  in 
English.  So  one  morning  before  getting  up  I 
thought,  suppose  I  were  to  try,  as  after  all  we 
have  the  same  sort  of  verse  in  our  own  beautiful 
dear  old  English — and  so  I  tried,  and  found  it 
feasible  with  only  two  or  three  hours'  work, 
rhymes  and  all.  It  is  half  sacred,  half  secular, 
half  humorous,  half  imaginative,  and  all  poetical 
in  the  highest  degree  of  its  kind:  showing  how 
the  first-bom  of  all  things  was  a  winged  thing, 
divine  and  creative  Love,  who  burst  out  from 
the  shell  of  everlasting  darkness  with  wings 
of  gold,  as  a  flower  bursts  out  of  the  bud,  and  of 
Him  come  all  the  Gods  and  all  generations  of 
men  and  birds — but  the  winged  creation  is  the 
likest  and  nearest  their  golden-winged  father 
and  creator.  And  so  on  till  he  comes  down  to 
the  old  Greek  reverence  for  all  birds,  and  the 
pretty  though  silly  superstitions  about  their 
giving  signs  and  omens  of  good  and  bad  luck, 
telling  what  to  do  or  avoid,  and  being  always 


198  LETTERS 

held  holy  and  precious.  I  wonder  (as  I  said  to 
Watts)  what  a  Greek  of  the  great  age  would  have 
thought  of  our  battues  and  pigeon -massacres ! 

Now  you  will  have  had  enough  of  them  and 
me.    .    .    . 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Nov.  6,  1880. 


.  .  .  In  an  hour  or  two  I  must  be  off  with 
Watts  to  Oxford  on  a  visit  to  Jowett — ^we  stay 
over  Simday  and  return  on  Monday,  and  I  have 
just  time  left  after  many  interruptions  to  scrawl 
these  few  lines .... 

Nor  have  I  any  more  important  news  than 
that  the  translated  poem  which  I  told  you  of  has 
made — if  that  signifies  much — a  greater  hit  than 
anything  original  I  have  done  for  a  long  time. 
Watts  tells  me  that  the  editor  of  the  AthencBum 
— ^where  it  appeared — ^went  down  to  Cambridge 
(he  is  sure)  on  purpose  to  see  what  effect  it  had 
produced,  on  the  day  of  the  publication;  and 
found  that  university  ringing  with  praise  of  it 
as  a  miracle  of  translation  both  for  spirit  and 
fidelity.  And  I  do  think  it  rather  a  wonder  that 
I  should  have  managed  it  line  for  line  and  word 
for  word  in  English  rhymes. 


OXFORD  REVISITED  199 

Excuse  my  vanity  or  self-complacency,  and 
accept  one  more  item  of  news. 

[Here  he  goes  on  to  describe  a  display  of  fire- 
works given  by  "Bertie"  on  Guy  Fawkes'  Day.] 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Nov.  16,  1880. 


We  had  a  nice  day  at  Oxford.  I  met  one  or 
two  old  friends  and  made  one  or  two  pleasant 
acquaintances.  It  is  pleasant  to  see  a  man  like 
Jowett  so  exactly  in  his  place  and  enjoying  it  and 
his  work  so  thoroughly.  He  had  turned  the  old 
dining-hall  into  a  really  splendid  modem  library 
for  the  use  of  the  undergraduates,  and  altogether 
has  wonderfully  transformed  and  improved  the 
look  of  the  college  since  the  dark  ages  when  I 
was  there.  It  was  a  lovely  day,  one  of  those  on 
which  the  whole  place,  and  especially  the  old 
college  gardens  look  their  loveliest.  .  .  .  My 
darling  mother,  it  is  only  too  good  of  you  to  care 
about  my  doings  in  translation  or  other  work  at 

all,  and  to  remind  me  of  dear 's  [his  father's] 

liking    for    a    former    attempt    of    mine.     The 
greatest  and  most  precious  compliment  (I  don't 


200  LETTERS 

like  that  word,  but  you  know  what  I  mean — 
something  which  one  feels  as  a  pleasure  and  a 
credit  in  one)  that  I  ever  received  for  any  mere 
writing  of  mine  was  his  telling  me  of  the  un- 
broken interest  with  which  he  had  read  right 
through  my  huge  play  of  Bothwell.  I  am  now 
going — or  meaning — to  begin  again  with  my  last 
play  on  the  subject  of  "Mary  Queen  of  Scots," 
dealing  with  her  last  days  and  heroic  death  in 
expiation  of  any  little — mistakes — in  her  pre- 
vious career.  It  is  a  difficult  subject  to  manage 
— that  is,  to  manage  worthily — but  as  Watts 
says,  there  can  be  none  finer.    .    .    . 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

2,  The  Terrace. 
Oct.  30,  '89. 
9.25  p.m. 

(Excuse  foolscap,  as  I  haven't  any  note  paper 
in  the  room,  and  am  too  tired  and  sleepy  to  go 
down  and  get  some  from  Walter.)  ...  I 
hope  you — even  in  London — are  enjoying  this 
divine  return  of  summer  in  which  we  are  basking 
here.  To-day  when  I  was  in  the  sea  it  was  Hke 
swimming  into  heaven — the  glorious  sunlight  on 
and  in  the  splendid  broad  rolling  waves  made  one 
feel  for  the  minute  as  if  one  was  in  another  and 


"LITTLE  MOTHERS''  201 

better  world — and  it  was  so  wann  and  soft  and 
mild  (with  this  lovely  west  wind  which  the  sea 
here  always  wants  to  make  it  perfect)  that  one 
would  have  taken  it  for  midsummer.  And  then 
this  afternoon  the  wind  grew  stronger  and  made 
it  so  magnificent  to  walk  by  and  look  at  as  it 
came  hurling  in  and  making  cascades  in  the  sun- 
light over  the  breakwaters,  that  I  think  I  was 
very  good  not  to  go  in  again.  I  came  home 
from  Shoreham  by  moonlight — when  there  was 
any — coming  and  going  in  and  out  of  great  masses 
of  bluish-black  cloud;  and  once  for  two  or  three 
minutes,  when  the  moon  hung  in  a  sort  of  loop 
or  gap  in  the  huge  dark  mass,  it  had  the  most 
absurdly  beautiful  look — as  if  it  was  winking. 
...  I  have  seen  to-day  .  .  .  the  very  small- 
est walking  baby  .  .  .  carrying  in  its  imper- 
ceptible arms  the  very  biggest,  heaviest,  and 
most  self-satisfied  baby — in  long  clothes — that 
ever  I  did  see.  One  longed  to  say,  "My  darling, 
won't  you  let  me  carry  Baby  for  you?"  only  one 
felt  one  couldn't  carry  it  half  so  well  or  safely 
as  this  precious  pet  who  didnH  come  up  to  my 
knee.  I  do  think  the  instinct  of  motherliness — 
of  loving  care  and  delight  and  thoughtfulness 
and  tenderness — in  tiny  girls  who  are  trusted 
with  babies  is  about  the  most  beautiful  and 


202  LETTERS 

delightful  thing  in  the  world!  Sometimes  one 
sees  a  little  boy,  charged  in  the  same  way,  as 
devoted  and  exulting  in  his  charge — and  that  is 
a  sweet  sight — but  with  little  girls  it  is  the  rule, 
which  shows  how  far  superior  you  are  to  us .  .  .  . 


To  Ms  Youngest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
June  I,  1887. 


I  must  write  literally  at  once  to  thank  you  for 
your  delightful  letter  of  yesterday,  as  you  tell 
me  you  are  going  to  Germany  next  week — which 
I  hope  will  do  you  all  the  good  and  give  you  all 
the  pleasure  in  the  world.  I  am  very  glad  you 
like  my  "ode"  so  well;  and  it  may  amuse  you 
to  hear  that  a  few  minutes  before  I  found  your 
letter  on  my  table  I  had  heard  that  it  (the  ode, 
not  the  letter  on  the  table)  was  greatly  liked  and 
admired  by  the  last  person — except  two — ^whom 
I  should  have  expected  to  like  or  admire  it — the 
Prince  of  Wales.  (The  other  two  are  the  Queen 
and  her  late  loyal  Premier — W.  E.  G.)  I  must 
say  (as  I  did  say  to  Watts  when  he  told  me)  that 
I  think  it  nothing  less  than  very  generous  of 
him — for,  as  Watts  says,  I  never  wrote  anything 
more  essentially  republican  in  spirit  and  in  tone. 
Indeed  he  wished  me  to  say,  and  thinks  I  should 


JUBILEE  ODE  203 

have  said,  more  about  the  Queen  than  the  one 
little  word  I  did  say;  but  on  such  matters  one 
can  only  be  guided  by  the  instinct  of  one's  con- 
science. I  quite  understand  what  you  say  about 
the  too  exclusive  praise  of  science ;  but  there  has 
been  nothing  since  the  days  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton 
like  the  advance  of  science  in  this  half -century, 
and  there  have  been  other  generations  as  great 
in  other  ways  (except,  /  should  say,  in  painting). 
And  one  canH  manage  to  touch  on  every  subject 
that  ought  to  be  handled  in  writing  of  our  fruit- 
ful and  wonderful  age,  in  the  course  of  250  lines. 
As  it  is.  Watts  thinks  the  poem  too  long;  I  am 
glad  you  do  not.  I  thought  (before  putting  pen 
to  paper)  that  it  would  be  the  right  length;  and 
I  think  it  is.  I  may  add  that  my  favourite 
stanza  is  the  46th. 

I  don't  think  you  ought  to  be  out  of  England 
on  the  jubilee  day,  when  we  think  (if  feasible) 
of  running  down — and  up — to  Beachy  Head  to 
see  the  bonfire  there .... 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 

June  28,  1887. 


.    .    .  Nothing  could  give  me  so  much  pleasure 
as  to  know  that  you  Hke  the  selection  [the  pub- 


204  LETTERS 

lished  Selections  from  Swinburne].  I  did  want 
to  put  in  some  of  my  longer  lyrical  poems,  but 
Watts  said  they  would  overweight  the  book, 
and  it  would  be  better  to  put  in  some  dramatic 
extracts  which  at  first  I  had  not  thought  of 
doing.  .  .  .  How  more  than  satisfactorily  the 
good  Queen's  Jubilee  has  gone  off!  Watts  and 
I  both  think  that  the  genuine  and  really  beauti- 
ful success  of  it  will  have  been — and  will  yet  be, 
in  its  general  and  lasting  influence — a  heavy 
blow  to  the  enemies  of  England.    .    .    . 

You  will  be  pleased  to  hear  that  I  had  the 
pleasure  of  treating  three  friends  on  the  day  of 
the  Jubilee  to  three  of  the  best  places  in  London 
for  a  view  of  the  ceremony — a  first-floor  window 
at  Chatto's,  which  is  a  comer  house  in  Piccadilly, 
from  whence  everything  could  be  seen.  Mr. 
Herbert  Mason  kindly  took  charge  of  his  imcle 
and  aimt  for  the  day — and  I  need  not  say, 
favoured  me  afterwards  with  copious  accounts 
of  the  spectacle — ^which  really  seems  to  have 
been  very  grand  and  beautiful,  though  I  am  sure 
I  could  never  have  sat  it  out. 

[The  following  letter,  written  in  the  last  May 
of  his  life,  shows  that  his  love  of  children  re- 
mained as  strong  as  ever  to  the  last.] 


A  LITTLE  CHILD  205 

To  his  Youngest  (then  the  only  remaining)  Sister 

The  Pines, 
May  I,  1908. 

What  a  heavenly  first  of  May!  I  never 
remember  anything  lovelier.  If  the  weather 
goes  on  like  this,  it  will  make  amends  for  the 
foulest  March  and  the  beastliest  April  I  can 
recollect ....  I  cannot  thank  you  enough  for 
your  very  great  kindness  in  complying  with  my 
request,  or  rather  petition  to  let  me  know  if  I 

could  help  you  again  to  be  of  service  to  little . 

It  is  only  through  you  that  I  ever  get  the  pleasure 
of  doing  such  a  thing — and  I  so  often  feel  as 
well  as  think  that  I  ought  as  well  as  that  I  want 
to.    .    .    . 

I  am  at  present  on  terms  of  intimate  friendship 
with  a  (really  and  truly)  most  lovely  lady  who  is 
not  as  yet  "well  stricken  in"  months — far  from 
it — quite  otherwise — ^but  who  really  seems  as 
glad  to  see  me  when  we  meet  as  I  am  to  see  her. 
Talk,  in  the  vulgar  sense  of  grown-up  people  or 
older  children,  we  do  not — for  the  very  best  of  all 
possible  reasons — but  we  converse  by  smiles  and 
kisses  in  a  far  better  and  sweeter  way.  I  long 
for  [his  mother]  to  see  her — but  nothing  brings 
[her]  so  vividly  back  to  me  as  the  sight  and  the 
touch  of  the  little  things  whom  I  am  sure  she 


206  LETTERS 

loved  so  that  she  bequeathed  her  love  of  them^ 
perhaps  rather  intensified  or  exaggerated — to  her 
possibly  irrational  first-born. 

I  look  forward  hopefully  to  three  weeks  hence, 
when  you  give  me  the  hope  that  we  may  see 
each  other  again. 

[The  following  letters  are  quoted,  somewhat  at 
random,  as  relating  to  various  of  his  works  at 
their  early  stages.] 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

3,  Gt.  Jas,  St., 
Dec.  5  ['741. 

...  I  have  made  you  a  copy  of  my  little  song 
for  Anne  Page.  I  must  say  without  mock 
modesty  that  I  have  been  amazed  at  the  praise 
it  has  received.  I  made  it  in  bed  the  day  before 
yesterday,  and  scribbled  it  down  as  soon  as  I 
was  dressed — ^and  thought  it  might  just  do  for 
music.  But  everybody  I  have  shown  it  to  has 
gone  into  ecstasies  over  it — old  and  young.  I 
am  going  to  limcheon  with  dear  old  Mrs.  Procter 
to-morrow,  and  I  mean  to  see  what  she  thinks  of 

it.     If  you  and think  it  rubbish,   I  shall 

neither  be  surprised  nor  offended;  for  it  is  not 
what  I  meant  to  write.     When  I  get  down  to 


SONG  FOR  ANNE  PAGE  207 

Holmwood  I  shall  bring  a  book  of  songs  of  Shake- 
speare's time  written  to  the  music  of  English 
musicians — Dowland,  Morley,  etc. — of  the  day — 
some  of  which  are  too  lovely,  both  as  poetry  and 
as  melody.  Perhaps  as  the  words  were  written 
for  the  notes  (now,  at  all  events,  the  distinction 
of  ranks  is  better  imderstood — Mr.  Arthur  Sulli- 
van applies  to  me — "Will  I  give  him  any  verses 
and  he  will  make  music  to  them?"  then  the  poet 
was  comniissioned  to  write  verses  to  suit  the 
musicians'  notes — par  exemple!)  Edward  will  be 
able  to  re-set  them.  I  believe  the  original  music 
exists  somewhere — but  it  has  never  been  repro- 
duced, and  heaven  knows  where  it  is  now. 

Shakespeare  and  /  (if  all  goes  well)  appear  to- 
gether on  the  19th,  so  I  must  be  in  town  till  then. 

SONG 


Love  laid  his  sleepless  head 
On  a  thorny  rosy  bed, 
And  his  eyes  with  tears  were  red 
And  pale  his  lips  as  the  dead. 


And  fear  and  sorrow  and  scorn 
Kept  watch  by  his  head  forlorn, 
Till  the  night  was  over  worn 
And  the  world  was  merry  with  morn. 


2o8  LETTERS 


And  joy  came  up  with  the  day, 
And  kissed  love's  lips  as  he  lay ; 
And  the  watchers  ghostly  and  grey 
Fled  from  his  pillow  away. 


And  his  eyes  as  the  dawn  grew  bright/ 
And  his  lips  waxed  ruddy  as  light. 
Sorrow  may  reign  for  a  night. 
But  day  shall  bring  back  delight. 

(This  is  to  be  sung  at  the  opening  of  the  4th 
scene  of  the  3rd  act  of  the  Merry  Wives  of  Wind- 
sor— the  manager  thought  of  making  poor  Anne 
Page  sing  something  to  Slender  !  !  !  but  I 
couldn't  stand  that.  I  said  the  only  possible 
place  in  the  play  for  a  song  was  here — and  they 
had  cut  out  this  part,  as  being  sentimental  and 
not  comically  sensational!  Then  he  said  if  I 
would  write  the  song  he  would  make  them  act  the 
scene!  So  I  have  been  of  some  little  service  to 
sentiment.) 

To  his  Mother 

New  Year's  Day,  1887. 

...  I  have  begun  a  new  dramatic  attempt — 
in  rhyme — founded  on  the  legendary  history  of 
ancient  Britain.     The  hero  is  the  son  of  our  first 


ETRETAT  209 

monarch,  King  Brute — a  name  that  always  de- 
lighted me,  but  I  am  afraid  it  must  be  "Brutus" 
in  serious  verse.  His  son  (as  all  students  of 
history  will  of  course  remember)  was  Locrine — 
who  came  to  grief  through  imprudently  marrying 
two  -wives,  and  whose  young  daughter  Sabrina 
became  (and  is  now)  the  goddess  of  the  river 
Severn  (so  called  after  her)  in  which  she  was 
drowned.  ...  I  mean  to  write  it  in  all 
manner  of  rhymed  metres,  which  I  hope  and 
expect  will  reduce  all  other  critics  to  the  verge  of 
raving  madness.  People  are  made  so  delightfully 
irritable  by  any  innovation  in  any  form  of  art! 


To  the  same 


Etretat, 
Sept.  14  [1894]. 


I  am  here  safe  and  so  well  and  fresh,  thanks 
to  the  mere  sight  and  smell  of  sea.  Such  a  lovely 
passage  on  Saturday — hard  due  east  wind,  alter- 
nate roll  sideways,  and  plunge  forward  and 
splashing — that  I  was  wild  with  pleasure  and 
others  with  sickness — /  had  left  that  behind  on 
shore.  I  must  hail  the  Flying  Dutchman  and  get 
taken  on  board  in  some  capacity — then,  never 
stopping  or  landing,  I  shall  always  be  well  and 
happy.     To  get  here  is  an  awful  labour — end- 


14 


2IO  LETTERS 

less  changes  of  line  (with  excessive  confusion, 
stupidity,  insolence) — and  at  last  no  beds  any- 
where and  two  hours'  drive  by  starlight  and  one 
antediluvian  gig-lamp  only — ^no  hotel  open — an 
hour's  helpless  and  hopeless  shivering — ^at  last  an 
improvised  bed  (at  2  a.m.  our  hotel  was  roused) 
— ^but  to-day  all  right.  Powell  has  got  the 
sweetest  little  old  farmhouse  fitted  up  inside  with 
music,  books,  drawings,  etc. — and  of  course 
pokes  me  into  the  nicest  room.  Do  tell  M.  the 
place  belonged  last  to  the  late  M.  Rene  Favarger. 
.  .  .  There  is  a  wild  little  garden  all  uphill, 
and  avenues  of  trees  about.  The  sea  is  splendid, 
and  the  cliffs  very  like  the  Isle  of  Wight — two 
arches  of  rock  each  side  of  the  bay,  and  one 
Needle  only,  exactly  like  half  the  Freshwater 
pair.  We  are  going  to  Rouen  soon  to  see  the 
Cathedral — a  cousin  of  P.'s  lives  there  {not  in 
the  cathedral!).  I  must  stop  and  save  postage 
in  time,  so  with  best  love  and  "  the  best  of  lucks 
to  all".  .  . 


To  the  same 


Vichy, 
Aug.  22nd. 


As  you  liked  the  last  flowers  I  sent  you,  I  send 
some  more  on  the  eve  of  leaving  this  place.     On 


THE  ARDOISIERE  211 

Tuesday  24th  we  start  for  a  fresh  tour  in  Au- 
vergne,  having  prosperously  completed  our  time 
and  our  "water-cure";  our  aim  being  the  old 
town  of  Le  Puy,  said  to  be  the  most  curious  in 
France. 

On  Friday  we  went  to  the  old  chateau  of  Bussy- 
Bourbon,  badly  restored  outside  with  sham 
patchwork  of  machicolations  which  are  as  pal- 
pably false  as  a  bad  wig,  but  inside  a  splendid 
sample  of  sombre  luxury,  with  admirable  corri- 
dors, panelled  chambers,  carvings,  windows, 
chapels,  and  so  on;  intricate  and  sumptuous  as 
a  labyrinth  built  up  into  a  palace,  still  inhabited 
by  its  old  family ;  seated  on  a  high  hill-top,  over- 
looking the  plains  to  the  mountain-range.  De- 
scending, we  returned  by  a  series  of  gorges  and 
winding  valleys  full  of  the  various  beauty  of  rock 
and  moor  and  wood  and  water.  Imagine,  for 
the  sort  of  scenery,  the  landslip  with  the  Lewis- 
burn  and  its  banks  put  into  it  and  magnified 
twentyfold  in  size,  closed  in  by  moimtain  slopes 
and  cUff s  clothed  from  top  to  foot  with  deep  and 
thick  forest,  and  winding  through  many  miles 
of  road  in  and  out  of  some  new  loveliness  at  every 
turn.  The  valley  is  called  the  Ardoisiere,  from 
its  slate  rocks,  which  are  hidden  in  trees  and 
veiled  with  flowers,  the  burn  the  Sichon ;  it  has 


212  LETTERS 

exactly  the  little  waterfalls,  pools,  rocks,  breaks, 
and  rapids  of  a  Northumbrian  bum.  I  got  you 
some  more  flowers  from  a  specially  beautiful  part 
of  the  bank,  between  the  wood  and  the  high  moor 
with  slopes  of  broken  slate  rock.  Others  that  I 
send  come  from  the  moor  of  Malavon,  where  we 
went  to-day.  The  gorge  leading  up  to  it  is  a 
lesser  Ardoisiere;  on  the  narrow  summit,  a  long 
rough  ridge  of  rock,  there  was  once  a  monastery 
of  the  Templars,  and  the  legends  are  still  fresh 
how  the  monk-knights  inveigled  yoimg  peasant 
girls  of  the  wild  neighbourhood,  murdered  and 
flung  them  into  oubliettes  and  filled  their  ceme- 
tery (still  marked  by  a  cross)  with  the  corpses. 
The  deserted  walls  were  only  razed  at  the  Revolu- 
tion; there  are  still  fragments  left  erect.  At  the 
top  of  the  long  ridge  are  two  wells  or  springs,  the 
Devil's  and  the  Blessed  Yirgm's;  jamais  Veau  n'a 
manquee,  says  a  board  set  up  by  hers,  but  it  is  dirty 
puddle  water.  His  is  of  course  said  to  be  bot- 
tomless, and  of  course  when  you  throw  in  a  stone 
you  hear  it  strike  in  a  few  seconds.  I  never  saw 
so  rocky  a  moor  so  rich  in  flowers.  The  burn 
and  its  wooded  cliffs  here  too  are  splendid. 

On  Friday  I  strained  or  jarred  my  right  foot 
in  jumping  from  rock  to  rock  of  the  Sichon  at 
its  little  falls,  so  that  yesterday  I  was  quite 


BEN  JONSON  213 

disabled  and  had  to  lay  it  up;  to-day  it  is  but 
all  quite  well,  and  managed  the  Malavon 
scramble  up  and  down  without  pain  or  difficulty. 
.  .  .  To-day  and  yesterday,  Burton  says,  have 
been  exactly  like  Brazilian  summer  weather.  .  .  . 
I  fear  this  will  make  you  reconsider  and 
repent  your  kind  and  gratifying  view  of  my 
tribute  to  my  good  old  friend!  Of  course  I 
agree  with  what  you  say  about  Dickens,  and 
you  must  know  how  much  store  I  set  by  your 
opinion — not  at  all  only  out  of  affection.  Don't 
you  know  that  Walter,  who  is  certainly  one  of 
the  ablest  people  I  ever  met,  says  that  you  are 
one  of  the  ablest  he  ever  met?  (I  use  the  word 
"people"  as  equivalent  to  "women  or  men," 
and  the  word  "able,"  as  equivalent  to  "intel- 
lectually gifted" — which  sounds  American). 
Still,  I  really  love  Dickens,  and  shall  always 
regard  his  faults  as  mere  spots  on  the  sun. 


To  his  Eldest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
Feb.  17,  1888, 


I  am  In  the  thick  of  a  very  serious  (I  was  going 
to  say  an  immense)  undertaking  in  which  I  ought 
to  have  A *s'  sympathies,  as  it  is  in  honour 

■  His  youngest  sister. 


214  LETTERS 

and  service  of  the  great  Royalist  and  Conserva- 
tive poet,  Ben  Jonson.  I  am  trying  to  give  some- 
thing like  a  decently  fair  and  adequate  account 
of  his  works,  which  has  never  yet  (in  my  opinion) 
been  done,  even  by  his  greatest  admirers.  And 
one  item  of  the  task  is  to  give  some  notice  of  no 
less  than  thirty-six  pageants  at  court,  got  up  for 
the  pleasure  of  Kings  James  and  Charles  I.  and 
their  queens.  Which  wearying  it  is,  rather,  but 
also  interesting  both  from  the  historical  and  the 
literary  point  of  view;  and  there  is  a  deal  of 
beautiful  verse  and  prose,  and  wonderful  inven- 
tion and  fun,  in  the  said  masques  or  pageants, 
which  must  have  been  very  splendid  and  delight- 
ful to  see.  And  how  the  old  poet  laureate  did 
understand  and  detest  and  abhor  the  Puritans! 
Happily  he  died  before  the  triumph  of  that 
accursed  sect. 


To  his  Youngest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
Sept.  13,  '88. 


I  am  rather  addled  with  much  hard  work  on 
Ben  Jonson's  prose  book  called  Discoveries  (in 
more  modem  English  the  title  would  be  "Obser- 
vations" or  perhaps  "Reflections") — a  little 
book  full  of  genius,  wit,  and  wisdom  as  well  as  (I 


MISS    ISABEL    SWINBURNE 


BEN  J  ON  SON  215 

lament  to  add)  High  Tory  principles  and  strong 
Royalist  doctrines — tempered,  however,  with  so 
much  sound  sense  and  just  feeling  that  if  his 
generous  and  unfortunate  patron  King  Charles  I. 
had  laid  some  of  its  remarks  to  heart  and  governed 
his  conduct  accordingly  instead  of  listening  to 
less  wise  and  certainly  not  more  loyal  counsels, 
I  think  it  very  likely  he  might  have  died  in  his 
bed  of  old  age,  having  kept  his  crown  on  to  the 
last  as  well  as  his  head. 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Sept.  21,  '88. 


I  had  to  sit  up  all  night — or  very  nearly — 
finishing  an  article  on  Ben  Jonson's  Discoveries 
(his  finest  work  in  undramatic  prose,  and  one 
which  I  think  would — and  must — interest  you 
to  read;  it  is  so  full  of  wit,  good  sense,  and 
wise  observation — let  alone  the  politics,  which 
are  more  in  your  line  than  mine);  and  then  I 
had  to  correct  a  hurried  proof,  swarming  with 
misprints  and  mis-pointings  (which  are  worse); 
and  it  had  to  be  sent  off  the  first  thing  in  the 
(Saturday)  morning  by  an  express  messenger  to 
the  City.  .  .  .  The  reason,  if  you  care  to  hear 
of  it,  for  this  great  haste,  was,  that  the  acting 


2i6  LETTERS 

editor  of  the  Fortnightly — the  Revd.  J.  Ver- 
schoyle  (whom  we  know  and  like  much) — wanted 
to  have  this  long  article  of  mine  in  the  October 
number,  and  I  was  very  glad  to  clear  it  off  and 
complete  my  studies  on  the  Poet  Laureate  of 
James  I.  and  Charles  I.  He  wrote  so  much,  and 
put  so  much  hard  work  Into  everything  he  under- 
took, that  I  really  shrank — year  after  year — 
from  the  task  of  giving  a  complete  critical  ac- 
count of  his  work;  but  it  is  done  at  last,  and  I 
venture  to  think  it  as  thorough  and  conscientious 
a  piece  of  work  as  any  even  of  his .... 

I  have  had  a  most  interesting  visit  this  afternoon 
from  a  grandson  of  Landor's — a  very  fine  young 
fellow  and  very  nice — ^who  is  going  off  to  Japan 
by  way  of  America,  and  hopes  to  call  again  when  he 
comes  back.  I  found  he  had  a  very  proper  devo- 
tion to  the  memory  of  his  illustrious  grandfather, 
and  was  much  interested  in  seeing  some  of  his 
rarest  editions — books  and  pamphlets  (two  dated 
1795)  which  I  had  the  pleasure  of  showing  him. 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 
Dec.  22,  1880. 


There  came  a  most  lovely  baby  in  arms  here 
on  a  visit  one  day,  and  it  beamed  on  me  the 


THOMAS  GRA  Y'S  LETTER  217 

minute  our  eyes  met.  But  of  all  children  out  of 
arms  Bertie  is  much  the  sweetest  going  at  any 
price.  One  thing  that  I  heard  a  day  or  two  since 
really  brings  tears  into  my  eyes  whenever  I 
think  of  it .  .  .  .  He  had  heard  an  account  of 
a  crocodile  hunt  in  which  the  she-crocodile  was 
killed  and  her  young  ones  left  helpless  and 
stranded — and  on  being  found  afterwards  crying 
quietly,  he  said  "he  was  so  sorry  for  the  poor 
little  crocodiles."  His  uncle  couldn't  help 
laughing  when  he  heard  of  it,  though  he  admitted 
it  was  very  touching — and  I  can't  help  crying 
though  I  admit  it  was  very  funny.  Think  of  the 
dear  little  innocent  thing — and  (as  Watts  says) 
the  manliest  little  fellow  of  his  age  he  ever  knew 
— in  tears  over  the  crocodile  orphans!  I  don't 
Imow  how  to  say  what  I  feel  about  children — it 
is  as  if  something  of  worship  was  mixed  with 
love  of  them  and  delight  in  them .... 


To  the  same 


The  Pines,: 
Christmas  Day,  1880. 


...  I  send  you  an  extract  from  a  letter 
dated  Oct.  18,  1753,  which  may  amuse  you  all  as 
it  did  me.  The  writer  was  travelling  south  from 
York: 


21 8  LETTERS 

"My  journey  was  not  so  bad  as  usual  in  a 
stage-coach.  There  was  a  Lady  Swinburne,  a 
Roman-Catholick,  not  young,  that  had  been 
much  abroad,  seen  a  great  deal,  knew  a  great 
many  people,  very  chatty  and  communicative, 
so  that  I  passed  my  time  very  well;  and  on  the 
third  day  left  them  at  Stilton,  and  got  to  Cam- 
bridge that  night. "  The  writer  was  Mr.  Thomas 
Gray,  "of  Pembroke-Hall  in  the  University  of 
Cambridge, "  and  author  of  the  Elegy. 


To  his  Youngest  Sister 


The  Pines, 

Aug.  22,  '6. 


...  I  was  glad  after  what  you  had  told  me  of 
her  sad  state,  to  see  that  our  dear  old  friend  of 
very  early  days.  Miss  Eliz.  Sewell,  had — to  use 
the  best  and  most  beautiful  phrase  ever  found  for 
our  common  passage  out  of  life — "entered  into 
rest." 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Oct.  12,  '6. 


I  am  sure  you  will  be  as  much  interested  as  I 
am  in  the  portrait  of  Miss  Bronte  by  the  original 
of  M.  Paul  Emanuel — whom  I  believe  you  love 


BALEN  219 

as  much  as  I  do.  I  don't  think  her — do  you? — • 
so  very  plain — so  ugly — as  she  thought  herself. 
The  mouth  is  rather  unshapely^ — but  not  so  bad 
as  to  make  everybody  turn  away.  The  poor 
noble  creature  must  have  been  wrong  and  a  bit 
morbid  when  she  said  "she  noticed  that  nobody 
in  a  drawing-room  who  had  caught  sight  of  her 
ever  looked  that  way  again." 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 
March  23,  1896. 


I  did  not  send  you  my  thanks  at  once  for  your 
most  kind  and  precious  letter  of  more  than  a 
week  since,  as  perhaps  I  ought  to  have  done, 
because  I  was  bent  on  being  able  to  tell  you  in 
my  answer  that  your  poem  was  ready  for  the 
press.  I  finished  it  last  night,  and  as  you  are  so 
kind  to  the  earlier  part  I  do  venture  to  think 
you  will  like  the  close ....  I  am  most  grate- 
ful to  you  for  accepting  my  dedication  in  such 
more  than  kind  terms.    .    .    . 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
March  31,  1896. 


Your  poem,  Walter  thinks,  may  be  out  in  six 
or  seven  weeks — I  had  hoped  to  say,  in  a  month, 


220  LETTERS 

but  Easter  holidays  Interfere  with  printer's  work. 
He  kindly  took  It  himself  to  Chatto's  and  gave 
my  orders  as  to  the  type  and  arrangement  of  the 
stanzas  on  each  page.  I  want  It  to  look  nice 
and  be  nice  for  your  eyes — In  good  large  print, 
so  as  to  make  a  pretty  book. 


To  his  Youngest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
Nov.  25,  '2. 


I  am  only  concerned  at  present  with  the 
pedigree  and  connections  of  the  papal  family  of 
Borgia.  I  have  got  two  beautifully  Illustrated 
big  books  on  the  subject  of  that  remarkable 
house.  .  .  .  There  Is  an  engraved  portrait  of 
him  [Csesar  Borgia]  In  the  latest  Borgia  book  I 
have  got  which  Is  simply  magnificent;  not  only 
proving  that  he  must  have  been  really  as  well  as 
traditionally  the  handsomest  and  most  splendid- 
looking  man  of  his  time,  but  bringing  one  face 
to  face  with  the  great  statesman  and  warrior 
whom  his  soldiers  would  have  followed  to  the 
death  through  good  and  evil  fortime.  No  doubt 
he  had  his  faults;  fratricide  Is  undeniably  a 
fault;  but  I  really  think  he  was  a  better  man, 
and  I  know  he  is  to  me  a  more  interesting  figure 
in  history  than  the  great  Napoleon .... 


SWALLOWS  ON  THE  LAKE  221 

I  am  writing  a  short  memoir  of  Shelley  and 
reviews  of  his  works  for  Chambers's  Encyclo- 
pcBdia  to  which  Walter  is  a  contributor.  He 
proposed  it  to  me  in  this  way — that  I  should 
review  the  works  and  somebody  else  should  sum 
up  the  story  of  the  too  short  life;  but  I  thought 
I  would  do  both  together,  as  the  one  explains  or 
at  least  elucidates  the  other.  I  must  say  It  is 
too  funny — not  to  say  uncanny — how  much 
there  is  in  common  between  us  two:  born  in 
exactly  the  same  [class],  sent  to  Eton  at  exactly 
the  same  age,  cast  out  of  Oxford — the  only  differ- 
ence being  that  I  was  not  formally  but  informally 
expelled,  and  holding  and  preaching  the  same  gen- 
eral views  in  the  poems  which  made  us  famous. 
And  yet  nobody  has  ever  pretended  to  think  me 
an  imitator  or  follower  of  my  elder-bom .... 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
June  26,  '3. 


.  .  .  This  day  week  I  saw  a  sight  that  I 
would  have  given  anything  I  could  give  to  have 
had  you  both  with  me  once  more  to  see.  Only  as 
it  was  pouring  with  rain  in  sheets  I  fear  you 
might  not  have  enjoyed  it  as  much  as  I  did.  But 
what  was  my  enjoyment  to  that  of  the  happy  and 


222  LETTERS 

lovely  birds  I  stood  still  in  the  drenching  rain  to 
watch?  The  whole  length  of  the  lake  was 
covered  with  flocks  of  swallows  flying  along  and 
across,  dipping  and  rising,  hovering  and  loiter- 
ing in  air  so  as  to  lose  nothing  of  the  delicious 
pleasure  of  the  shower-bath.  I  never  knew  they 
were  so  fond  of  being  bathed  in  water  pouring 
straight  down  from  heaven.  Their  flight  to  and 
fro  and  up  and  down  was  indeed  "silent  music. " 
Nor  did  I  ever  see  a  tenth  part,  I  think,  of  so 
many  swallows  together.  One  flew  close  up  to 
me  and  looked  into  my  eyes  with  a  bright  friendly 
glance  (I  ventured  to  think)  as  who  should  say 
"Isn't  it  lovely  weather?"   .    .    . 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Mar.  23,  1908. 


I  am,  or  rather,  I  ought  to  be  very  busy  on 
part  of  the  book  which  will  be  my  chief  work  in 
prose — The  Age  of  Shakespeare.  This  means 
of  course  a  careful  study  of  his  predecessors, 
contemporaries,  and  successors  in  the  art  of 
dramatic  poetry — from  two  years  after  the  rout 
of  the  Armada  to  the  dawn  of  the  great  civil  war 
— just  about  (if  not  exactly)  half  a  century. 
Most  of  it  is  finished  and  in  print,  but  I  am  not 


MISCELLANEOUS  223 

quite  half-way  through  the  fifty  plays  of  the  two 
fellow-poets  whom  the  churchmen  and  cavaliers 
of  Charles  I.'s  time  so  naturally  preferred  to 
Shakespeare — Beaumont  and  Fletcher. 

[The  excerpts  from  letters  which  follow  are  of 
a  private  nature;  but  I  allow  myself  to  quote 
them  on  account  of  their  extreme  beauty  of 
sentiment  and  expression,  and  their  entire  refuta- 
tion of  the  idea  that  there  had  ever  been  the 
slightest  alienation  of  affection  between  him  and 
the  mother  whom  he  adored,  with  unshaken 
loyalty,  from  childhood  to  old  age.] 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 
Sept.  21,  1892. 


It  is  SO  beautiful  and  delightful  to  think  of 
"being  together  when  this  life  is  over,"  as  you 
say,  and  of  seeing  things  no  longer  "in  a  glass 
darkly, "  but  all  who  have  ever  tried  to  do  a  little 
bit  of  what  they  thought  right  being  brought 
together — if  what  they  thought  right  was  not 
absolutely  wicked  and  shocking,  like  the  beliefs 
of  persecutors — and  understanding  and  loving 
each  other,  that  I  sometimes  feel  as  if  it  ought 
hardly  to  be  talked  about.     The  most  wonder- 


224  LETTERS 

ftdly  and  divinely  unselfish  man  I  ever  knew, 
Mazzlni,  whose  whole  life  was  self-sacrifice,  was 
so  intensely  possessed  by  this  faith  that  if  he 
could  have  been  uncharitable  it  would  have 
been  towards  the  disbelievers  and  preachers  of 
disbelief  in  it .    .    .    . 

To  the  same  {after  an  illness) 

The   Pines, 
June  21,  1893. 

How  am  I  to  thank  you  enough  for  yoiu*  pre- 
cious letter?  You  know  what  a  relief  and  delight 
it  is  to  see  your  beautiftil  handwriting  again,  in 
pencil  as  legible  as  ink.  I  trust  you  will  soon 
have  a  nice  country  place  to  go  to  and  recruit  in, 
but  first  you  will  let  me  come  and  see  you.  I 
don't  believe  even  this  terribly  long  illness  can 
really  have  altered  you  one  bit.  Ill  or  well,  at 
all  ages,  you  always  had  and  always  will  have  the 
loveliest  and  sweetest  face  possible  and  appro- 
priate to  whatever  was  or  will  be  its  time  of 
Hfe. 

To  the  same 

Sept.  7,  1 89 1. 

I  was  so  glad  to  be  at  home — it  is  always 
home  where  you  are — in  those  first  days  of  sor- 


MISCELLANEOUS  225 

row,  and  to  know  that  you  were  glad  to  have 
me. 

To  the  same 

Sept.  18,  '92. 

It  felt  very  sad  and  odd  to  me  at  first  (really 
rather  like  a  first  day  at  school)  to  go  to  bed  with- 
out the  thought  that  I  should  see  you  in  the 
morning  to  look  forward  to.  But  I  must  be 
thankful  for  so  good  a  time  as  I  have  had  and 
shall  always  be  happy  when  I  think  of.  The 
garden  and  the  moorside  and  the  mere  will 
always  have  the  pleasantest  of  associations  for 
me — and,  above  all,  that  beautiful  last  drive 
through  the  wood  to  your  favourite  point  of 
view. 

To  the  same  {on  a  butterfly  New  Year's  Card) 

1894. 
Perhaps  you  know  that  the  same  Greek  word 
means  "butterfly"  and  "soul";  or  rather  the 
Greek  word  for  "soul"  is  "butterfly"  (or  vice 
versa  for  "butterfly"  is  "soul").  It  is  cer- 
tainly the  most  beautiful  and  appropriate  image 
or  type  of  resurrection  and  immortality  that  ever 
was  or  can  be  thought  of — and  therefore  very 

IS 


226  LETTERS 

seasonable  as  an  allegory  of  the  new  year  rising 
from  the  grave  of  the  old  one. 

To  the  same 

April,  30,  1893. 

...  A  comer  in  the  neighbouring  woods  or 
copses  where  I  had  discovered  the  loveliest  group 
or  natural  arrangement  of  white  and  pink  or  red 
hawthorns  I  ever  saw  anywhere;  and  just  as  we 
got  there  the  sun  amiably  came  out  (to  please 
me,  who  am  one  of  his  old-world  worshippers — 
do  you  know  that  grand  last  saying  of  the  dying 
Mirabeau  as  he  looked  at  the  sunrise  he  had  just 
lived  to  see — "  Si  ce  n'est  pas  la  Dieu,  c'est  au 
moins  son  image  "?) — and  transfigured  and  glori- 
fied everything. 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

27  Jan.  '91. 

I  am  very  glad  that  dear  old  Irvine  [their  aged 
gardener]  had  so  happy  an  end.  ...  I  feel 
with  you  about  the  appropriateness  for  him  of 
that  divine  old  hymn  with  its  "gallant  walks." 

To  the  same  {after  his  Mother^ s  funeral) 

Dec.  4,  '96. 

I  know  no  such  comfort  in  sorrow  as  the  sight 
of  little  children.     A  look  or  a  smile  from  them 


MISCELLA  NEO  US  227 

not  only  re-assures  one  that  "of  such  is  the  king- 
dom of  heaven, "  but  takes  one  thither  and  makes 
one  a  denizen  of  that  kingdom — for  a  few 
minutes,  anyhow.    .    .    . 

June  II,  '97. 

I  often  and  often  think  of  what  you  said  to  me 
on  Dec.  ist  just  outside  the  Churchyard  after  the 
funeral — that  we  must  be  more  and  closer  to 
each  other  now  than  ever. 

To  the  same 

19  Jan.,  '92. 

I  have  been  "on  the  rampage"  tramping  over 
the  frozen  roads  and  commons  for  ten  or  twelve 
miles  at  a  rate  of  from  four  to  five  miles  an  hour 
(I  am  told)  and  enjoying  myself  outrageously. 
The  beauty  of  frost  in  this  neighbourhood  is 
something  beyond  description.  The  shadows  of 
the  frozen  sprays  or  sprigs  of  heather  against  the 
sun  at  noon  on  the  hard  bright  ground  were  so 
lovely  that  one  had  to  stop  and  stare  at  them; 
and  you  couldn't  wish  for  a  prettier  sight  than 
the  shining  levels  of  ice  covered  with  skaters  of 
all  ages  and  sizes. 


228  LETTERS 

5  Jan.,  '94. 

The  whin  bushes  are  miracles  of  beauty — all 
swans'  down  and  diamonds  and  the  ground 
almost  too  splendid  to  look  at — miles  on  un- 
broken miles  of  starry  jewellery  or  flower-like 
tufts  and  clusters  of  snow. 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 
June  4,  1895. 


I  must  apologize  for  being  so  late  in  thanking 
you  for  your  lovely  letter  of  May  21st.  I  am 
shocked  when  I  compare  the  dates.  ...  I 
hope  that  even  in  these  bad  times  you  will  find 
a  nice  place  with  gardens  and  fields  sufficient. 
Of  course  removing  must  be  costly  as  well  as 
troublesome,  but  to  get  settled  for  good  in  a  nice 
bit  of  country  would  surely  be  worth  anything. 
I  should  prefer  such  a  retreat  as  the  Shag  Rock 
.  .  .  but  possibly  it  might  not  quite  do  for  a 
family  establishment. 

I  am  glad  you  had  a  visit  from  Mrs.  Boyle  and 
Lady  Tennyson,  and  hope  it  did  not  over-tire  you. 

Perhaps  you  may  care  to  hear  that  I  am  mak- 
ing out  a  scheme  for  a  narrative  poem  of  King 
Arthur's  time,  founded  on  a  beautiful  tragic 
legend  about  two  brothers — Knights  of  North- 


t 

i 


MISCELLANEOUS  229 

umberland.  I  have  not  finished  my  sketch  of 
the  story  yet,  but  Walter  Hkes  the  opening 
stanzas — inspired  by  the  (late)  hawthorns  about 
here  which  are  too  lovely  while  they  last  (the 
flowers  are  all  over  now,  of  course) — that  I  am 
much  encoiiraged  to  get  on  with  it. 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
June  16,  1895. 


I  am  not  quite  sure  but  much  afraid  that  I 
have  not  yet  thanked  you  for  your  letter  of  the 
5th.  When  one  has  other  writing  on  hand  one  is 
apt,  unless  one  answers  a  letter  at  once,  to  think 
it  has  been  answered  when  very  possibly  it 
hasn't.  ...  I  wish  you  could  come  and  see 
and  smell  the  haymaking  in  Wimbledon  Park, 
it  is  always  so  pretty.  .  .  .  The  Yorkshire 
moors  sound  very  fascinating,  but  to  be  again 
under  your  roof  anywhere  would  always  of  course 
be  for  me  the  greatest  of  all  pleasures  and 
privileges.  I  long  to  hear  of  you  settled  down  to 
your  "  villeggiatura. "  (Do  you  remember  our 
Goldoni  readings  when  I  was  a  little  chap?  You 
got  me  the  modern  languages  prize  at  Eton,  you 
know.)  .  .  .  Dear  good  William  Rossetti  has 
just  sent  me  the  table-cover,  which  is  really  a 


230  LETTERS 

very  beautifiil  thing — much  too  big  for  my  table 
— indeed  it  covers  my  sofa,  which  is  not  a  small 
one.  I  need  not  say  how  much  I  value  a  relic  of 
his  sister,  especially  one  that  was  originally  his 
gift  to  her.  ...  It  may  perhaps  gratify  you 
— as  it  made  me  very  glad  to  read — what  the 
Saturday  Review  says  in  its  notice  of  a  book  on 
Lion  Hunting  in  Somaliland.  "The  pig-sticking 
adventures  are  less  interesting,  though  the  hand- 
to-hand  fight  with  a  great  boar,  when  Captain 
Melliss  had  had  to  go  on  foot  into  the  thick 
jimgle,  recalls  Mr.  Swinburne's  fine  description 
in  Atalanta  of  the  slaying  of  the  Calydonian  boar, 
and  it  is  interesting  to  observe  how  the  plain 
record  of  the  sportsman  literally  corroborates 
the  vivid  picture  of  the  poet's  imagination." 

To  the  same 

July  19,  1882. 

I  have  to  thank  you,  as  I  would  and  should 
have  done,  but  for  interruptions,  by  return  of 
post,  for  giving  me  by  far  the  greatest  pleasure 
that  anything  connected  with  any  work  of  mine 
can  give  me.  I  know  you  cannot  need  to  be 
assured  how  infinitely  more  to  me  than  the  ap- 
plause of  all  the  reviews  on  earth  is  a  word  of 
praise  from  you — above  all,  on  the  subject  of  my 


MISCELLANEOUS  231 

poems  on  little  children.  ...  As  I  said  to 
Watts,  What  would  three  columns  of  large  type 
in  the  Times  be  compared  with  three  lines  from 
your  hand?  But  I  cannot  and  will  not  try  to  tell 
you  the  delight  you  have  given  me .... 

.  .  .  My  movements  must  in  some  degree 
depend  upon  yours,  as  I  could  not  dream  of  letting 
you  go  gadding  and  gallivanting  to  foreign  shores 
without  our  meeting  to  say  goodbye  and  "a 
rivederci"  (the  prettiest  and  most  sensible  of 
all  forms  of  parting).  I  said  it  to  the  Burtons 
(who  are  leaving  England  once  more)  last  week, 
when  we  dined  with  them  at  our  old  friend  Dr. 
Bird's.  Old  Mr.  Home  (the  poet,  Australian 
magistrate,  dramatist,  and  among  other  things 
correspondent — as  I  may  remember — of  Mrs. 
Browning)  was  of  the  party — as  wonderful  a 
young  man  of  eighty -five  as  Mrs.  Procter  is,  at 
the  same  age,  a  wonderful  young  woman.  He  has 
sent  me  sundry  photographs  of  children  in  sign 
of  sympathy  with  my  poems  on  the  subject.  .   .  . 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
Easter  Day,  April  5,  1885. 

.  .  .  Your  letters  did  come  last  evening — just 
at  dinner  time.     I  did  not  answer  them  the  same 


232  LETTERS 

night  because  I  had  a  fancy  that  I  should  like  the 
first  words  I  wrote  in  this  new  year  of  my  life  to 
be  addressed  to  you.    .    .    . 

.  .  .  What  stuff  people  talk  about  youth 
being  the  happiest  time  of  life!  Thank  God  .  .  . 
I  am  very  much  more  than  twice  as  happy  now  as 
I  was  when  half  my  present  age  just  twenty-four 
years  ago. 

It  would  be  nice  if  you  could  come  down  here 
some  warm  spring  day  and  take  a  short  quiet 
drive  along  my  favourite  road  with  me,  which  I 
have  so  long  wanted  you  to  see  in  its  beauty — the 
moor  miscalled  a  common,  the  quaint  old  town 
(and  especially  one  long  lovely  bit  of  old  weather- 
stained  many-coloured  wall,  which  we  all  delight 
in),  and  the  beautiful  lawns,  meadows,  avenues, 
and  copses  of  Wimbledon  Park.  All  this  you 
might  see  in  an  hour's  gentle  drive.  I  have 
taken  the  walk  before  breakfast  more  than 
once. 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
June  1 6, 1886. 


I  have  been  walking  this  afternoon  over  the 
roads  we  drove  over  yesterday,  following  exactly 
the  trace  of  the  carriage  (except  that  in  going  out 


MISCELLANEOUS  233 

to  Wimbledon  I  took  the  heath  or  the  open 
down  instead  of  the  high  road  skirting  it) 
and  going  over  in  my  mind  every  minute  and 
every  incident  of  the  drive  which  I  shall 
always  remember,  I  am  sure,  as  one  of  the 
most  thoroughly  delightful  things  I  have  to 
remember  in  all  the  days  of  my  life.  It  was 
quite  perfect  as  a  realization  of  all  my  dreams; 
and  every  inch  of  the  way  to-day,  every  turn 
and  every  tree  and  every  change  of  prospect, 
was  more  enjoyable  to  me  than  even  it  ever 
was  before .... 


To  the  same 


The  Pines, 
Sept.  21,  1890. 


I  am  imhappy  to  think  of  your  having  suffered 
so  much  as  I  fear  you  must  have  done  since  I  last 
saw  you.  But  I  cannot  think  you  will  ever  look 
"very  much  altered"  to  me.  I  may  say  now 
how  I  have  been  longing  to  see  you  again  and 
thinking  of  the  happy  time  I  had  under  your 
(temporary)  roof  last  year.  Every  morning  my 
first  thought  was  of  delight  that  I  was  going  to 
see  you,  and  every  night  my  last  and  strongest 
was  one  of  thankfulness  that  I  had  had  another 
day  of  you .... 


234  LETTERS 

To  his  Eldest  Sister 

Dec.  27,  '95. 

If  only  poor  Coleridge  could — if  only  poor 
Rossetti  could — have  taken  the  same  wholesome 
and  happy  and  grateful  delight  in  Nature  as 
Wordsworth  and  Tennyson  did  and  as  Walter 
and  I  do,  they  would  have  been  so  much  happier 
— and  (I  hope  and  think)  such  much  better  men. 


To  his  Youngest  Sister 


The  Pines, 
June  21,  '5. 


Very  many  thanks  for  my  returned  proofs.  I 
am  very  really  happy  to  hear  that  you  read  my 
little  old  story  with  interest,  but  rather  sorry  you 
"wish  it  hadn't  been  letters."  Do  you  know 
that  all  the  novels  approved  and  admired  by  Dr. 
Johnson  were  cast  in  that  form?  Of  course,  as  I 
said  to  M ^  in  a  letter  written  after  I  re- 
ceived your  note,  it  wants  more  attention  than  a 
flowing  narrative,  and  bores  the  reader  of  our 
days  imless  he  cares  to  think  while  reading — a 
little;  but  I  have  just  got  a  letter  by  return  of 
post  saying  she  doesn't  think  it  at  all  a  bad  way 
of  telling  a  story.     But  I  know  Walter  is  right 

«  The  editor. 


MISCELLANEOUS  235 

in  saying  that  the  public  will  agree  with  you  and 
the  book  won't  sell  half  as  well  as  if  it  had  been 
written  in  the  third  person.  M.  has  not  seen 
anything  of  it:  you  are  the  only  person  whom  I 
have  sent  or  should  think  of  sending  the  proofs 
to. 

You  will,  I  know,  be  pleased  to  hear  that  your 
liking  of  the  little  bit  of  description  of  "the  dif- 
ferent homes"  was  anticipated  more  than  forty 
years  ago  (the  letters  are  dated  just  about  the 
time  I  wrote  them  or  perhaps  a  year  earlier)  by 
our  dear  Ned  Jones;  who  was  as  cordial  and 
delightful  in  his  enjoyment  (rather  than  critic- 
ism) of  the  whole  book.  I  should  never  be  sur- 
prised to  find  you  and  him  agreeing  on  any  point. 

To  his  Mother 

The  Pines, 
June  8th  [no  year  given]. 

I  need  not  say  how  glad  I  was  to  get  your  letter 
the  day  before  yesterday  .  .  .  besides  the 
message  from  dear  old  Uncle  Percy '  who  was  so 
kind  a  host  to  me  in  past  years.  I  suppose  it 
implies  that  he  would  be  pleased  rather  than 
bored  or  put  out  by  receiving  the  copy  of  my  last 
new  book  which  I  shall  tell  Chatto  to  send  him. 

'  The  Honble.  Percy  Ashburnham. 


236  LETTERS 

I  am  very  sincerely  and  deeply  gratified  by  what 
he  says  of  my  Shakespeare  book.  It  is  a  great 
pleasure  to  me  always  that  anything  I  do  should 
find  favour  in  the  sight  of  old  people  (let  alone 
one's  nearest  relations),  and  I  have  had  great 
good  luck  (I  think)  generally  in  that  line  and 
especially  of  late — ^beginning  with  Hugo  himself, 
and  going  on  with  Trelawny,  Halliwell-Phillips, 
and  Collier — the  Patriarch  of  the  whole  tribe. 
Add  up  their  four  several  ages,  and  it  would  be 
going  on  for  four  himdred  years — the  time  of  the 
Wars  of  the  Roses.  Think  of  corresponding  with 
four  men  whose  lives  united  would  reach  back  to 
the  days  of  York  and  Lancaster  (or  nearly  as 
far!). 

Talking  of  old  age  naturally  reminds  me  of  the 
venerable  Bertie,  who  in  spite  of  the  certainly 
capricious  weather  continues  to  enjoy  his  usual 
health  and  spirits.  His  aunt,  I  am  sorry  to  say, 
left  us  yesterday,  having  stayed  just  long  enough 
to  hear  the  end  of  a  new  poem  which  I  finished 
the  day  before  in  honour  of  dear  old  Landor — 
another  friend  of  ninety  years  upward.  It  is 
800  lines  long — 280  longer  than  that  on  Hugo. 
I  fear  the  length  will  frighten  you,  but  Watts 
deliberately  pronounces  it  the  finest  thing  I  ever 
wrote.     I  am  very  glad  if  it  is,  for  I  hold  his 


POLITICS  237 

memory  in  the  most  sincere  affection  and  rever- 
ence, and  can  very  honestly  declare  that  I  would 
sincerely  prefer  to  any  success  or  profit  or  noto- 
riety the  knowledge  that  I  had  done  something  to 
spread  his  fame  or  serve  his  memory  or  help  to 
widen  the  circle  of  his  admirers  and  students  or 
to  hasten  the  inevitable  but  too  long  delaying 
date  when  all  Englishmen  will  agree  in  ranking 
his  name  among  those  of  our  noblest  countrymen 
and  greatest  writers. 

[The  following  extracts  are  of  a  political  nature 
and  are  given  as  specimens  of  his  views  and  feel- 
ings on  the  questions  of  the  day.] 


To  his  Mother 


The  Pines, 
Dec.  8,  1882. 


...  I  was  very  glad  to  have  news  of  you  all 
and  to  be  assured,  as  I  knew  I  should  be,  of  your 
kind  sympathy  both  in  my  enjoyment  of  the 
honour  done  me  and  the  kindness  shown  me  in 
Paris,  and  also  in  the  one  serious  drawback  to 
that  enjoyment.  After  all  it  is  only  on  rare 
occasions  that  I  really  feel  the  want  of  ears,  going 
out  so  very  seldom  as  I  do — and  I  am  unspeak- 
ably thankful  that  my  eyes,  which  I  should  feel 


238  LETTERS 

the  want  of  more  than  most  people,  are  so  good 
and  strong. 

I  am  grieved  at  two  pieces  of  news  in  the 
papers — the  trouble  which  has  overtaken  poor 
good  Mrs.  Joynes,  who  was  so  infinitely  kind  to 
me,  at  the  age  when  I  most  needed  kindness — 
and  the  death  of  M.  Louis  Blanc,  one  of  the  very 
best,  bravest,  gentlest,  and  most  imselfish  men 
in  the  world.  Even  the  Times  cannot  pretend 
or  venture  to  question  that.  I  shall  always 
remember  with  pleasure  the  one  evening  I  spent 
in  his  company,  when  I  had  the  honour  of  con- 
verting that  eminent  Republican  and  Socialist 
leader  to  Jacobitism  (which  I  always  boast  of) 
by  the  surely  unanswerable  argimient  that  if  we 
had  succeeded  in  bringing  back  the  Stuarts  and 
driving  out  the  Guelphs,  England  would  now  be 
a  Republic.  For  we  never  could  have  been  quite 
such  servile  idiots  as  to  recall  the  Hanover  rats — 
if  we  had  once  driven  them  out — and  we  cer- 
tainly should  have  had  to  get  rid  of  the  Stuarts 
a  third  time — we  could  not  have  stood  more  than 
20  or  30  years  more  of  their  government — and 
faute  de  mieux  (as  royalists  would  ssiy)—faute  de 
pis,  as  I  should  say — we  must  have  proclaimed 
the  Commonwealth  of  England — this  time  with- 
out the  Puritanism  and  Militarism  which  made 


POLITICS  239 

the  ruin  of  Cromwell's  Government  inevitable  as 
soon  as  the  personal  influence  of  the  great  usurper 
and  dictator  was  removed  by  his  death. 

I  hope  I  have  not  bored  you  by  my  historical 
argument  in  favour  of  the  Jacobites — but  I  am 
proud  to  say  that  the  great  republican  historian 
to  whom  I  first  explained  it  seemed  really  struck 
by  its  originality  and  plausibility,  and  admitted 
most  courteously  that  I  had  made  out  a  good 
case. 

To  his  Youngest  Sister 

Sept.  24/99. 

I  had  all  but  forgotten  what  I  had  "made  a 
note  of"  to  tell  you.  A  week  or  two  since  I  re- 
ceived a  request  to  let  my  name  be  added  to  a 
committee  of  sympathizers  with  that  unspeak- 
able old  villain  Paul  Kruger  and  his  lying, 
thieving,  murdering  Boers ;  a  committee  convened 
to  protest  against  the  wickedness  of  the  Govern- 
ment which  (as  far  as  I  can  see)  is  very  seriously 
to  blame  for  not  giving  the  rascals  far  shorter 
shrift — by  the  despatch  of  an  ultimatum  months 
ago.  I  think  you  would  have  approved  of  the 
note  which  informed  these  worthies  that  I  was 
about  the  very  last  man  in  England  to  allow 
my  name  to  be  associated  with  theirs. 


240  LETTERS 

To  his  Mother 

The  Pines, 
April  9, 1883. 

I  send  you  the  nitmber  of  Rappel  containing 
my  letter  on  the  "Irish  Question"  which  you 
said  you  should  like  to  see.  Of  course  I  did  not 
ask  the  editor  to  suppress  either  my  signature  or 

the  mention  of 's  name  as  the  encourager  of 

tortures  and  murderers  of  women;  it  was  my 
friend  Auguste  Vacquerie's  own  consideration 
and  forethought  which  induced  him  to  do  so — 
greatly  to  Watts's  relief  and  satisfaction — rather 
than  expose  me  to  the  chance  of  such  reprisals 
as  are  usually  practised  or  attempted  by  those 
noble  and  heroic  patriots  who  have  made  the 
very  name  of  Irishman  as  loathsome  in  the 
American  republic  as  in  the  English  kingdom. 
If  I  can  find  the  numbers  of  the  Pall  Mall 
Gazette  containing  the  very  curious  and  interesting 
history  of  the  extermination  of  a  league  of  Irish 
miu-derers  by  the  imited  action  of  private  citizens 
in  America,  I  will  send  them  to  you.  I  think  you 
will — as  Watts  does — agree  with  me  that  there 
is  some  danger  of  these  wretches  being  the  means 
of  introducing  into  England  the  spirit  of  Lynch 
law — which  is  perhaps  better  than  none  at  all; 


IRISH  QUESTION  241 

and  that  if  the  English  people  is  once  thoroughly 
roused  by  excess  of  provocation,  there  will  and 
must  be  a  risk  of  blind  and  unjust  retaliation — of 
which  there  has  been  more  than  enough  on  both 
sides  in  the  past.  In  reading  my  letter,  you  will 
understand  that  the  Rappel  had  been  quoting  the 
tyranny  of  former  English  rulers,  and  especially 
of  Cromwell,  as  an  explanation  of  the  existing 
spirit  of  Ireland  towards  England;  and  though 
of  course  not  a  justification,  a  palliation  of  Irish 
political  crime.  This,  I  need  not  tell  you,  is  the 
favourite  plea  of  Irish  orators  and  writers;  and 
I  thought  it  would  be  a  good  and  useful  work  to 
point  out  that  it  is  about  as  just  and  reasonable 
as  it  would  be  to  suggest  that  the  horrible  atro- 
cities exercised  by  French  kings  on  whole  pro- 
vinces of  France  in  the  name  of  the  Church 
and  the  Monarchy  should  be  laid  to  the  charge 
of  the  existing  French  Government.  Bad  and 
cruel  and  stupid  as  the  English — under  consider- 
able provocation,  it  must  be  admitted — have 
sometimes,  and  too  often,  been  in  their  rule  of 
Ireland,  there  is  nothing  even  in  that  unpleasant 
part  of  our  history  comparable  to  the  horrors  of 
the  "  dragonnades "  which  Louis  XIV  inflicted 
on  his  subjects  to  please  the  Church,  his  mistress, 

and  that  sainted  prelate  Bossuct:  but  nobody 
16 


242  LETTERS 

suggests  that  the  South  of  France  should  rise  in 
rebelHon  against  any  form  of  government  in  con- 
sequence of  what  happened  two  hundred  years 
ago.  And  yet,  if  the  argument  is  worth  anything 
in  the  one  case,  it  must  be  worth  as  much  or  more 
in  the  other. 

To  the  same 

The  Pines, 
May  1 6,  1886.' 

I  really  cannot  tell  you — I  should  have  to  use 
very  demonstrative  language  if  I  tried — how 
much  pleasure  your  approbation  of  my  late 
political  work  gives  me.  Of  course  it  was  a  great 
interruption  to  other  things;  but  I  really  thought 
it  was  every  loyal  Englishman's  duty  to  do  what 
he  could  at  such  a  time  against  such  traitors, 
such  cowards,  such  time-servers,  and  such  idiots 
as  infest  the  ways  of  politics  just  now.  It  was 
something,  certainly,  for  one  man — quite  outside 
the  active  or  political  or  social  world — to  get  a 
hearing  for  what  he  had  to  say,  and  an  opening 
for  the  attack  he  had  to  make,  in  three  leading 
papers  at  once.    And  I  may  say,  from  what  I 

'  I  am  inclined  to  think  this  is  a  wrong  date.  The  poem  and  other 
incidents  mentioned  in  the  letter  belong  to  1887. 


JUBILEE   ODE  243 

hear,  that  the  attack  has  not  fallen  flat.  But  my 
old  and  dear  friend  Blind's  letter  was  of  course 
the  great  proof  to  me  that  all  my  friends  for 
whose  opinions  I  cared  a  brass  farthing  were  and 
must  be  with  me.  People  nowadays  seem  to 
forget  .  .  .  that  the  first  principle  of  a  Repub- 
lican is  and  must  be  Unity  (without  which 
liberty  can  only  mean  licence — or  pure  anarchy — 
or  pretentious  hypocrisy)  and  that  Republicans 
ought  in  common  consistency  and  honesty  to  the 
first  to  protest  against  a  party  of  anarchists  and 
intriguers  whose  policy  is  to  break  up  the  state. 
.  .  .  And  now  I  send  you — as  in  duty  (and 
pleasure)  bound,  the  first  copy  printed  of  my 
ode' — that  is,  one  of  the  two  first  copies — the 
other  going  back  to  the  printer's.  So  you  will  be 
the  first  to  read  it  outside  this  household  (except 
of  course  the  magazine  people) ;  and  I  hope  you 
will  like  it.  I  got  up  two  mornings  rimning  at 
five  o'clock  to  work  on  it,  so  as  to  get  it  finished 
in  good  time.  Watts  was  much  taken  with  the 
26th^   stanza   in   particular,   about   the   recent 

*  The  Commonweal. 

»XXVI. 

The  forces  of  the  dark  dissolve, 

The  doorways  of  the  dark  are  broken; 
The  word  that  casts  out  night  is  spoken, 

And  whence  the  springs  of  things  evolve. 
Light,  born  of  night,  bears  token. 


244  LETTERS 

triumphs  of  science:  I  want  you  to  like  the  36th' 
and  I  doubt  not  you  will  approve  of  the  compli- 
ments paid  to  the  present  Unionist  government, 
and  the  allusion  to  its  precious  predecessor,  in  the 
40th  and  the  five  following.  But  I  will  say  I 
never  wrote  anything  that  I  thought  better  of 
than  I  do  of  the  last  seven  stanzas. 

[The  four  extracts  which  finish  the  collection 
are  from  letters  addressed  to  myself.  There  is 
more  difficulty  in  making  a  selection  from  these 
on  account  of  the  jokes  and  fictitious  matter 
which  bulk  largely  in  our  correspondence  of 
many  years. — Editor.] 

The  Pines, 
Sept.  II  '99. 

Here  is  your  promised  proof.  I  shall  be  glad 
if  you  like  the  play  as  well  or  half  as  well  as 
[Watts]  does.  He  is  satisfactory!  He  borrowed 
this  proof  to  go  thro'  it  for  the  second  time  and  is 
if  anything  more  cordial  and  enthusiastic  than 
when  I  read  it  out  to  him.  ...  I  have  fol- 
lowed the  real  dates  exactly — it  all  happened, 

'  XXXVI. 
Thy  quickening  woods  rejoice  and  sing 

Till  earth  seems  glorious  as  the  sea. 

With  yearning  love  too  glad  for  glee 
The  world's  heart  quivers  towards  the  spring 

As  all  our  hearts  toward  thee. 


ROSAMUND  245 

and  I  wrote  it  all  in  the  month  of  June  (you  will 
recognize  my  Norse  abhorrence  of  hot  weather 
and  southern  climate  here  and  there — how  could 
our  Northmen  stand  it!  and  fight  in  it!)— and 
where  I  have  altered  the  facts  of  history,  it  has 
been  only  to  raise  the  characters  to  a  rather 
higher  level,  and  tone  down  what  was  too  naif 
or  primitive  in  half-savage  straightforwardness 
for  anything  but  a  Saga.  Hildegard  is  entirely 
my  invention:  in  the  two  earlier  EngHsh  plays 
on  the  subject  the  love  affair  of  Almachildes  is 
simply  a  vulgar  intrigue  between  a  fast  young 
soldier  and  a  girl  of  no  character  in  the  royal 
household.  Rosamund,  so  far  from  dying  with 
the  husband  she  had  immolated  to  the  memory  of 
her  father,  bolted  with  Almachildes  across  the 
frontier  into  Pannonia,  where  in  due  time  they 
were  slain,  if  I  rightly  remember,  by  Lombard 
avengers  of  their  great  warrior  king.  I  think 
you  will  agree  with  W.  that  my  alterations  are 
both  poetical  and  moral  improvements  on  the 
real  story. 

Oct.  II,  '99. 

I  am  truly  grateful  to  you  for  telling  me  just 
what  you  think  about  the  subject  of  my  new 
play.     It  is  certainly  a  queer  as  well  as  a  grim 


246  LETTERS 

story,  and  it  is  very  good  of  you  to  say  what  is 
very  gratifying  to  me,  that  "no  one  could  have 
told  it  as  I  have  done,  with  such  delicate 
touches, "  but  the  skull-cup  and  the  wife's  desper- 
ate revenge  always  fascinated  me  when  I  was 
quite  a  little  fellow  and  read  Rosmunda  with  my 
mother. 

[These  are  some  remarks  upon  the  MS.  trans- 
lation of  a  modern  Icelandic  play,  which  I  had 
lent  him  to  look  at.] 

[1899.1 
I  have  now  read  The  Cavemen  carefully 
through,  which  was  much  pleasanter  to  do  in 
your  beautiful  handwriting  than  in  "type- 
writing," which  is  my  abhorrence.  I  couldn't 
try  to  read  anything  type-written.  It  is  a  very 
curious  and  interesting  work.  The  fault  in  it 
seems  to  me  the  want  of  centralized  interest — 
the  diffusion  of  shifting  interests  among  so  many 
changing  characters  that  it  is  impossible,  even  if 
you  remember  who  is  who,  to  bring  your  atten- 
tion to  bear  and  keep  it  fixed  on  any  definite  or 
definable  point.  When  I  read  the  14th  page  I 
did  sympathize  with  Valnastakk  (or  shall  we 
say,  Coat-o'-mail?)  in  his  delight  and  sympathy 


"THE  CAVEMEN''  247 

with  a  swirling  spate.  There  is  nothing  on  land 
so  lovely  and  exciting  and  "  sympathique "  to 
look  upon — except  the  finest  waterfalls.  Once 
when  I  was  quite  a  little  boy — years  before  Eton, 
I  think — my  father  came  into  my  bedroom  at 
Mounces  (I  wish  you  had  ever  been  with  us 
there),  took  me  out  of  bed,  wrapped  (or  happit) 
me  in  a  blanket  and  carried  me  through  the 
garden,  across  the  road,  through  the  copse  and 
down  the  bank  to  see  the  place  where  I  had 
bathed  that  morning  before  breakfast,  in  a  clear 
pool  at  the  foot  of  a  waterfall — and  where  there 
was  now  neither  waterfall  nor  pool,  but  one  un- 
broken yellow  torrent  roaring  like  continuous 
thunder.  Perhaps  I  didn't  enjoy  and  don't 
(as  you  see)  remember  it!   .    .    . 

How  beautiful  are  the  words  of  the  dying  man 
at  page  53.  I  might  say  much  more  if  I  had 
time,  but  will  only  congratulate  you  on  the 
achievement  of  a  rather  considerable  task.  If 
you  will  know,  I  think  the  killing  of  a  wretched 
old  carline  rather  horrid — I  have  a  certain  rever- 
ence for  age  and  sex,  however  unpleasant  any 
particular  crone  may  make  herself.  .  .  .  [He 
ends  this  letter  by  saying]  I  have  just  room  and 
time  to  add  a  word  of  thanks  to  B — [the  "Baby 
Kinswoman"    of   his   exquisite   poem]    for   her 


248  LETTERS 

delicious  primroses.     They  are  under  my  eyes 
and  nose  as  I  write.    .    .    . 

[He  never  forgot  to  acknowledge  little  gifts, 
and  more  especially  appreciated  those  of  a  child.] 

[Here  is  a  characteristic  description  of  a 
storm.] 

I  say,  have  you  heard  or  read  about  the  great 
and  glorious  thunderctorm  of  last  Tuesday?  I 
had  the  jolly  good  luck  to  be  caught  in  it — on  an 
open  common  or  moorland.  I  don't  know  if 
you're  like  me  in  that,  but  the  sight  of  lightning 
and  the  sound  of  thunder  do  and  always  did 
intoxicate  me — a  harmless  and  wholesome  intoxi- 
cation, but  I  know  no  other  word  for  it.  I  bet 
I've  told  you  how  my  tutor  caught  me  once 
two-thirds  out  of  window  on  the  top  story  and 
jerked  me  down  violently  by  one  leg  when  I  was 
bathing  in  storm.  ''What  on  earth  are  you 
doing?"  "Oh,  sir,  isn't  it  nice?  (I  felt  that 
"jolly"  was  too  commonplace  a  word  for  any- 
thing so  superlatively  jolly.)  "Nice!"  said 
Mr.  Joynes,  in  large  capitals,  "It's  awftiV  .  .  . 
You  should  have  seen  how  lovely  the  lightning 
was — and  heard  the  thunder  reminding  "poor 
Mr.  Handel"  that  even  he  can  only  imitate  its 


A  STORM  249 

really  heavenly  music.  Once  there  came,  or 
seemed  to  come  down  just  straight  in  front  of  my 
face  such  a  wonderful  momentary  flower  of  pure 
white  fire,  complete  in  its  calyx  and  its  petals 
literally  radiating  from  the  lovely  centre,  that 
one  felt  it  was  almost  too  heavenly  for  a  dweller 
on  earth  to  see.  And  the  rain  was  a  real  bath. 
I  was  a  drenched  rag  when  I  got  home — soaked 
through  from  head  to  foot — but  it  did  me  no 
end  of  good.  I  wish  I  could  command  storm 
at  will,  like  a  witch.  But  perhaps  it  might  be 
rough  on  other  people. 

[This  gives  a  little  more  about  the  "Etret^t" 
episode.] 

.  .  .  Sport  is  all  very  well  and  wholesome  by 
way  of  training,  but  such  a  death'  is  no  more 
desirable  than  mine  would  have  been  when  I  was 
swept  out  to  sea  for  over  two  miles  and  picked  up 
at  the  last  gasp  by  a  French  fishing  boat  .  .  . 
in  the  'sixties.  It  was  a  jolly  good  lark,  and  the 
fellows  who  had  saved  my  Hfe  couldn't  make 
enough  of  me.  The  friend  I  was  staying  with  at 
"Etretat"  (another  old  Etonian — dead  now, 
poor  dear  fellow)  when  I  came  back  again  as  his 

'  I  have  not  the  quotation  at  hand,  but  it  refers  to  a  youth  killed 
in  sport  of  some  kind. — (Ed.) 


250  LETTERS 

guest  next  year,  and  was  rather  astounded  at 
finding  myself  rushed  at,  seized  by  arms  and 
legs,  hoisted  and  cheered,  and  carried  all  down 
the  street  with  shouts  of  welcome,  by  the  fisher 
folk  and  sailors  who  knew  me  again  at  once,  said 
to  me  after  I  was  let  down  in  rather  a  dishevelled 
state  of  mind  and  body,  "Why,  don't  you  know 
you're  their  hero?  "  and  I  said,  "  I  don't  see  where 
the  hero  comes  in — if  I'd  gone  in  after  somebody 
who  was  drowning  it  would  have  been  a  credit- 
able sort  of  thing — but  it  was  just  an  accident  " 
But  did  I  ever  tell  you  about  our  going  out  after- 
wards with  these  fellows  fishing  pieuvres — real 
live  pieuvres?  and  the  oldest  grey-haired  fisher- 
man said  he  quite  believed  that  there  were  such 
pieuvres  as  could  hold  a  strong  man  down  and 
suck  him  to  death.  ...  I  put  my  little 
finger  to  the  round  cup-like  tip  of  one  of  the 
suckers  or  tentacles  of  quite  a  little  one,  evidently 
dying — when  I  pulled  it  away  it  hurt  so  that  I 
looked  at  the  tip  of  my  finger  expecting  to  see  it 
all  raw  and  bloody — but  it  had  not  quite  taken 
the  skin  off .    .    .    . 


EDITOR'S  POSTSCRIPT 

I  THINK  these  excerpts,  though  only  a  few  of 
many  that  might  be  quoted,  are  sufficient,  being 
spread  over  a  large  portion  of  the  writer's  life, 
to  give  a  fair  idea  of  the  deeper  side  of  his  charac- 
ter, as  well  as  to  show  how  little  in  essentials  the 
character  altered  with  time.  Certainly  the 
more  brilliant,  if  sometimes  erratic,  coruscations 
of  his  genius,  as  well  as  the  perfervid  Republican- 
ism which  became  a  part  of  his  nature,  were 
modified  to  some  extent  in  later  years,  but  the 
spirit  and  the  fire  were  there,  and  there  was  no 
diminution  of  his  intellectual  and  creative  power, 
up  to  his  last  da^^s.  The  time  of  his  vivid  and 
fiery  youth  was  not  that  of  his  best  production. 
It  was  in  the  little  home  at  Putney,  with  its 
quiet  household  routine,  varied  by  the  visits  of 
intimate  friends,  varied  for  him,  too,  by  his  own 
visits  to  relations,  or  to  the  friends  afflicted  with 
pain  and  trouble,  whom  it  was  his  province  to 
amuse  and  cheer — his  one  annual  holiday  by  the 
sea — his  daily  walks,   communing  with  nature 

251 


252  EDITORS  POSTSCRIPT 

and  the  little  children  whom  he  loved;  it  was 
among  these  surroundings  that  the  great  im- 
perishable works  of  his  life  were  brought  forth. 
His  deafness,  which  increased  with  years,  made 
him  averse  from  mixing  in  society  on  a  large 
scale,  but  every  other  faculty  was  as  keen  as  a 
youth's,  and  his  enjoyment  in  his  friends'  com- 
pany was  unquestionable.  Neither,  as  the  let- 
ters plainly  show,  did  his  literary  work  hinder 
him  from  attending  to  the  claims  of  his  family. 
Over  and  over  again,  the  New  Year  brings  his 
first  written  words  to  his  mother — after  her 
death,  to  his  eldest  sister.  Birthdays  and  family 
anniversaries  were  remembered  and  marked ;  and 
he  often  writes  with  pleasure  to  one  of  the  home 
circle  describing  some  gift  which  he  has  in  store 
for  another  member  of  it — some  book,  curio,  or 
autograph — with  an  amusing  and  childlike  in- 
sistence on  keeping  it  a  dead  secret.  Indeed,  the 
children's  lover  had  a  great  deal  of  the  child 
always  in  his  composition,  as  many  of  the  finest 
characters  have;  and  it  was  among  the  most  at- 
tractive features,  to  those  who  knew  him,  in  a 
personality  hard  for  the  outward  world  to  under- 
stand, and  which  will  perhaps  never  really  be 
fully  understood. 


APPENDIX 

A  LETTER  which  has  been  preserved,  written  by 
Charlotte  Countess  of  Ashburnham  to  her  daugh- 
ter, mother  of  the  poet,  contains  an  interesting  reference 
to  Algernon's  first  months  at  Eton.  She  mentions  a  visit 
from  a  cousin  who  also  had  been  to  place  his  boy  at 
Eton 


"and  had  heard  from  Dr.  Hawtrey  such  a  character 
of  dear  [Algernon]!  his  cleverness,  his  amiability  and 
goodness  in  every  way,  in  short  as  if  the  boy  of  highest 
character  in  the  school .  .  .  .  Dr.  H.  was  quite  ignor- 
ant of  the  relationship. " 

Some  old  diaries  kept  by  Miss  Julia  Swinburne, 
aunt  of  the  poet,  also  contain  some  entries — of  the 
shortest,  but  not  without  interest — regarding  Algernon. 
On  the  yth  April,  1837,  occurs  the  line — "Heard  from 
Charles  that  J.  had  a  son  born  Ap.  5th,  5  a.m." 

In  the  July  of  the  same  year  we  read:  "Chas.  and 
Jane  and  their  infant  arrived  about  9" — that  being  for 
their  accustomed  stay  at  Capheaton  in  Northumber- 
land, with  the  grandparents.  It  was  thus  at  three  months 
old  that  the  poet  was  introduced  to  the  county  for  which 
he  retained  through  life  the  utmost  love  and  admiration — 
the  cradle  of  his  race. 

Under  date  of  24th  April,  1849,  is  the  entry:  "At  2 
Chas.  took  Algn.  to  Eton,  his  first  going  there." 

253 


254  APPENDIX 

Extract  from  a  letter  from  the  Revd.   Father 
Cong  RE  VE  (of  Cowley). 

Our  Tutor,  Mr.  Joynes,  introduced  Swinburne  and 
me  when  we  came  to  Eton,  as  boys  who  would  have  as 
an  excuse  for  comradeship  that  we  were  neither  of  us 
good  at  the  games  in  the  fields — football,  cricket,  etc. — 
I,  because  of  some  physical  infirmity,  he  because  of  his 
absorption  in  literature. 

So  we  accidentally  became  friends.  I  have  still  a 
little  book  of  his  which  he  gave  me,  writing  in  it  my 
name  and  his  own  in  his  large  childlike  handwriting — 
Talfourd's  Tragedies. 

For  our  walks  we  generally  tended  to  the  solitude 
of  the  fields  along  the  riverside.  He  used  to  discourse 
with  me  at  large  about  Elizabethan  Dramatic  Poets, 
of  whose  plays  he  knew  pages  and  pages  by  heart.  In 
these  solitary  paths  he  would  intone  for  me  innumerable 
stately  lines  from  them,  "mouthing  out  his  hollow  o's 
and  a's"  with  the  fervent  inspiration  of  poet  or  prophet. 
He  could  not  trudge  along  the  grassy  path  as  I  did,  but 
rather  seemed  to  dance  along  a  little  before  me,  with  eyes 
and  hands  lifted  up,  as  he  gave  out  the  great  words  with 
enthusiasm. 

We  met  again  later  on  at  Oxford,  and  I  remember  his 
leaving  me  his  first  edition  of  Tennyson's  Poems  that  I 
might  copy  for  myself  several  short  poems  that  were 
omitted  in  all  subsequent  editions. 

Algernon's  Parents 

(Page  ID  of  Recollections.)  "His  parents  were  the  last 
persons,  etc."  This  must  not  be  taken  as  implying 
that  his  parents  were  either  unsympathetic,  or  unap- 
preciative  of  any  talent  displayed  by  their  children.  I 
should  like  to  draw  attention  to  this,  because  Admiral 


APPENDIX 


255 


Swinburne  has  been  sometimes  spoken  of  as  a  stem  dis- 
ciplinarian, with  no  leaning  to  the  gentler  arts  of  poetry, 
painting,  and  music.  To  us  who  knew  him  the  impres- 
sion seems  entirely  wrong.  A  disciplinarian  undoubtedly 
he  was,  as  his  profession  and  training  required  of  him: 
stern  he  could  be  when  necessary;  but  a  more  wise,  tender, 
and  affectionate  father  could  hardly  exist.  I  do  not 
think  he  was  a  great  reader  of  poetry,  but  he  could  appre- 
ciate what  was  good;  and  Algernon,  as  we  have  seen, 
speaks  with  pride  and  pleasure  of  his  father's  having  read 
the  whole  of  his  Bothwell — no  small  undertaking.  Music 
he  loved,  and  painting  also,  without  practising  either  art 
himself,  though  he  could  draw  and  design,  and  was 
something  of  a  mechanical  genius,  devoted  to  turning 
and  carpentry  of  all  kinds.  Several  of  his  sisters  were 
accomplished  artists,  favourite  pupils  of  Alulready  and 
Turner:  and  an  uncle — Edward  Swinburne — devoted  the 
whole  of  a  long  life  to  the  brush;  his  works,  though  he 
painted  only  for  love  of  the  art,  being  worthy  to  rank  with 
those  of  Varley  and  Barret  and  other  great  water-colour 
painters  of  the  time. 

And  what  shall  be  said  of  the  mother,  whom  Algernon 
adored  with  a  lifelong  affection,  reverence,  and  admira- 
tion— fervent  in  sympathy  where  they  agreed,  gentle, 
respectful,  and  delicately  reticent  where  they  could  not 
see  eye  to  eye?  It  seems  impossible  and  unfair  not  to 
speak  of  her,  in  any  memoir  of  him,  in  whom  she  inspired 
a  devotion  which  nothing  could  shake.  She  was  worthy 
of  it.  She  possessed  a  character  and  temperament  full 
of  brilliancj'  and  fire,  with  a  strong  serious  or  spiritual 
side  to  it — enthusiastic,  decided,  self-reliant  in  the  best 
sense,  and  withal  a  fund  of  himiour  which  charmed  all  who 
were  familiar  with  her,  and  which  she  transmitted  in  no 
mean  share  to  all  her  children.  The  most  watchful, 
sympathetic,  and  affectionate  mother — save  one — that  I 
ever  knew,  it  is  not  difficult  to  estimate  the  effect  of  her 


256  APPENDIX 

influence  in  moulding  the  character  of  her  first-born. 
His  own  references  to  their  old  readings  together — the 
words  "you  taught  me  that,  you  know" — which  occur 
more  than  once  among  his  letters,  show  how  he  valued 
her  teaching,  to  the  end  of  his  life.  With  regard  to  her 
opinion  of  his  work,  he  has  repeatedly  said  that  in  respect 
of  her  praise  or  approbation,  the  criticisms  of  the  public 
were  as  nothing  in  his  eyes.  And  in  all  that  he  addressed 
directly  to  her,  whether  in  verse  or  in  prose,  we  find  the 
same  spirit  of  tender  affection  and  lofty  admiration. 

The  portrait  which  is  here  reproduced  gives  to  my 
mind  a  far  better,  more  truthful  idea  of  her  gracious 
and  dignified  presence  than  any  ordinary  photograph 
ever  taken. 


INDEX 


AcADEMvExHiBiTiON.the  Royal, 

102 

Afton  Downs,  67 

Age  of  Shakespeare,  The,  222 

Aix-la-Chapelle,  43 

Allen,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Grant,  178 

Ambrosian  Library  at  Milan,  the, 
64 

Anapaests,  experiments  in,  35 

Animals,  cruelty  to,  7 

Anne  Page,  a  song  for,  206 

Ardoisiere  Valley,  the,  211 

Armada,  The,  128,  131 

Arnold,  Dr.,  88 

Ashburnham,  Charlotte,  Count- 
ess of,  253 

Ashburnham,  the  Earls  of,  3, 
29 

Ashburnham,   the   Hon.   Percy, 

235 
Ashburnham,  Colonel,  the  Hon. 

Thomas,  43  et  seq.,  100 
Atalanta  in  Calydon,  20,  29,  142 
Atkinson,  a  rhyme  to,  21 
Autumn  and  Winter,  85 
Auvergne,  tours  in,  11 5- 117,  184, 

211  et  seq. 


B 


Balaklava,  the  Charge  at,  14 

Balen,  the  Tale  of,  219 

Ballad  of  the  A  rmada,  by  Watts- 

Dunton,  128 
Barret,  George,  255 
Bastard,  Thomas,  quoted,   153 
Bastille,  fall  of  the,  anniversary 

of,  85 
Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  223 
Bedford,  the  Duke  of,  120 


Bellini,  Gentile,  a  picture  by,  65 
Bentley's    Quarterly   Review,    an 

article  in,  57 
Bernard  de  Morlaix,  The  Rhythm 

of,  35  e(  seq. 
Betsy  Prig,  166 
Bird,  Dr.,  231 
Bismarck,  94 

Blackstone,  an  analysis  of,  59 
Blake,  William,  123 
Blanc,  Louis,  238 
Blind,  Karl,  93,  243 
Boer  War,  the,  239 
Bonaparte,  Louis,  88 
Bonchurch  Down,  6 
Bonifazio,  a  picture  by,  64 
Borgia,  Caesar,  220 
Borgia,  Lucrezia,  64 
Borne  river,  the,  115 
Borrow,  George,  157 
Bossuet,  241 

Both-well,  92,  119,  200,  255 
Boyle,  Mrs.,  22% 
Brera  Gallery,  the,  in  Milan,  64 
Brescia,  pictures  by  Carpaccio 

at,  65 
Bronte,  Charlotte,  a  portrait  of, 

218 
Brooke,  Lady,  150 
Brooke  Rectory,  7 
Broughton,  Rhoda,  147 
Brown,  Ford  Madox,  126 
Browning,  Robert,  125 
Browning,  Mrs.,  231 
Burne-Jones,  Sir  E.,   137,    138, 

144,  235 
Burns,  Robert,  123 
Burton,  Sir  Richard,   114,   119, 

151,  193,  213,  231 
Bussy-Bourbon,  the  Chdteau  of, 

211 
Bust  of  Swinburne,   Dressier 's, 

160,  161 


257 


258 


INDEX 


Byron,  Mrs.  Procter  and,  127 
,  a  life  of,  152 


Calais,  43,  44 

Can  Grande,  the  monument  to, 
at  Verona,  66 

Cannes,  124 

Capheaton,  Sir  John  Swinburne's 
house  at,  11,  51 

Carker,  the  author's  impersona- 
tion of,  9 

Carlyle's  Reminiscences,  154 

Carpaccio,  pictures  by,  65 

Cat,  To  a,  7 

Catullus,  33 

Cavemen,  The,  246 

Chapman,  George,  the  edition  of 
his  works,  120 

Charles  I.,  King,  214,  215 

Chaucer,  Geofifrey,  152 

Children  of  the  Chapel,  The,  2 1 

Children,  two,  of  Shoreham,  183 

Clatt,  a  Scotch  village,  24 

Clermont-Ferrand,  192 

Cloud-scenery,  184 

Coblenz,  49 

Cold  weather,  161 

Coleridge,  S.  T.,  234 

Coleridge,  Mrs.  Procter  and,  127 

Collier,  J.  P.,  236 

Cologne,  44,  47,  48 

Cologne  Cathedral,  44-46 

Commonweal,  The,  243,  244 

Congreve,  Father,  a  letter  from, 

254 

Cornish  Holiday,  A,  22 

Craik,  Mrs.,   134 

Crivelli,  pictures  by,  64 

Cromer,  "the  metropolitan 
splendours  of,"  176 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  152 

Culver  Cliff,  Swinburne's  ex- 
ploit upon,  13-18 


Dante,  182 

Darnley,  Lord  Morley  on  char- 
acter of,  120 

Death,  an  explanation  of,  to  a 
child,  164,  165 

De  Tabley,  Lord,  146 


Dicconson,  Miss,  wife  of  a  Swin- 
burne, ancestor,  4 
Dickens,  Charles,  8,  92,  157,  213 
Discoveries,   Ben  Jonson's,  214, 

215 

Discovery,  the  return  of  the,  140 
Dombey  and  Son,  8 
Dorian,  Madame,  77 
Dramas,  earl}'',  10 
Dressier,  a  young  German  sculp- 
tor, 161 
Dryden,  John,  152 
Dumas,  Alexandre,  148 


E 


East  Dene,  6,  9,  52,  74,  140 

Elizabethan  songs,  a  book  of, 
207 

Ely,  the  Bishop  of,  145 

En  Voyage,  Hugo's  posthumous 
work,  no 

Eton  Museum,  the  bust  of  Swin- 
burne now  in,  160 

Etretat,  17,  117,  209,  210,  249 

Euripides,  34 


Faure,  J.,  94 
Favarger,  M.  Ren6,  210 
Franco-Prussian  War,  comments 

on  the,  70,  94 
FrankHn,  Sir  John,  a  poem  on, 

57.  58 

Fraser's  Magazine,  the.verse  m, 
10 

Frauenlob,  the  Minstrel,  monu- 
ment to,  55 

French  ancestry,  a  legend  of,  4 

Freshwater  Gate,  67,  210 

Frost,  227 

Furniss,  Harry,  a  caricature  by, 
107 


Galimberti,  Signor,  his  tribute 

to  Swinburne,  97,  98 
Galliambics,  experiments  in,  33 

et  seq. 
Gamp,  Mrs.,  quoted,  152 
German  Emperor,  the,  142,  144 
German  music,  69 


INDEX 


259 


Gentile  da  Fabriano,  a  picture 

by,  64 
Gladstone,  W.  E.,  202 
Gordon,  General,  119 
Got,  the  French  actor,  in  Le  Roi 

s'amuse,  72 
Graham,  Mr.  Lorimer,  124 
Grammar  of  Assent,  The,  108 
Gray,  Thomas,  a  letter  written 

by,  218 
Grosart,  Dr.,  153 
Guernsey,  187 

H 

Halliwell-Phillips,  J.  O.,  159, 
236 

Harris,  Mrs.,  and  Mrs.  Gamp, 

152 
Hawthorns,  226 
Hawtrey,  Dr.,  253 
Handel,  66,  248 
Handwriting,   Swinburne's,   42 
Heaven,  Walter,  a  pupil  to  Mr. 

Woodford,  140 
Hook,  a  painting  by,  102 
Home,  R.  H.,  231 
Hugo,  Victor,  62,  70  et  seq.,  no, 

131,  146,  148,  149,  154,  188, 

190,  236 

, ,  a  snap-shot  of,  84 

, ,   Swinburne's  article 

on,  80,  81 
Hugo,  Mile.,  marriage  of,  83 


Inchbold,  J.  W.,  142 
Inquisition,  the  Fathers  of  the, 

129 
Iphigenia  in  Aulis,  34 
Irish  Question,  the,  240  et  seq. 
Irvine,  an  old  gardener,  226 
Italian  sympathies,  96,  97,  98, 

1 62 


J 


Jacobite  song,  a,  90 
Jacobitism,  238 
James  I.,  King,  214 
"Jermy,  Good  Mr.,"  176 
Johnson,  Mrs.,  62 


Jolliffe,  Captain,  49 

Jonson,  Ben,  214,  215 

Jowett,  Benjamin,  the  Master  of 

Balliol,  62,  68  et  seq.,  107,  155, 

157,  158,  196,  198,   199 
Joynes,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  197,  238, 

248,  254 
Jubilee   Ode,    Swinburne's,    202 

et  seq. 

K 


Keats,  Mrs.  Procter  and,   126, 
127 

,  the  grave  of,  144 

King  Lear,  71 
Kirkup,  Seymour,  124 
Kruger,  Paul,  239 


Lamartine,  78 

Lamb,    Charles,    Mrs.    Procter 

and,  127 
Lancing  Church,  168,  185 
Lancing-on-Sea,  168,  169 
Landor,    Walter    Savage,     125, 

139,  154.  236 
Landseer,  white  bulls  by,  102 
Leigh  House,  141 
Lcighton,  Lord,  141 
Leopardo,  The  Last  Supper  by, 

65 

Le  Puy  and  the  Cathedral,  115, 

116,  117 
Uhge,  43 
Limericks,  21 
Linton,   Mrs.   Lynn,   death   of, 

139,  140 
Lockene,  the,    near  Wiesbaden, 

51. 

Locrine,  209 
Louis  Philippe,  King,  71 
Louis  XIV.,  King,  241 
Love's  Cross-Currents,  234 
Luini,  pictures  by,  65 
Lundy  Island,  140 
Lutwcis,  the  Robber,  51 
Lyra     Aposiolica,     Newman's 

verses  in  the,  106,  109 
Lytton,  Lord,  90,  91 


26o 


INDEX 


M 

Macaulay's  Lays,  1 1 
Malines,  44 

Marlowe,  Christopher,  154 
Marston,  D.  Westland,  89 
Marston,  Philip  Bourke,  89,  92, 

134 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  an  article 

on,  195 
Mary  Stuart,  60,  148 
Mason,    Herbert    ("Bertie"), 

Watts-Dunton's  nephew,    J^, 

95,  132,  162,  164,  165, 194, 195, 

199,  204,  217, 236 
Maud,  Tennyson's,  11 
Mayence  Cathedral,  54 
Mazzini,  79,  83,  87  et  seq.,  93, 96, 

97,   98,    loi,    103;   death   of, 

105,  125,  133,  147,  224 
Mdaulle,  M.,  149 
Mediterranean,     the,     and     its 

resorts,  67,  124 
Melliss,  Captain,  230 
Mentone,  124,  154 
Merry   Wives  of  Windsor,   The, 

208 
Milan,  what  to  see  in,  64  et  seq. 
Millais,  a  painting  by,  102 
Milton,  John,  152 
Morley,  Lord,  and  his  review  of 

Bothwell,  119,  120,  122,  124 
Moroni,  a  portrait  by,  65 
Morris,  William,  136,  161 
Mottistone,  67 
Mounces,  Sir  John  Swinburne's 

Northumbrian    property,    1 1 , 

43,  50,  51 

Moxon  stops  publishing  Swin- 
burne's poems,  90 

Mulready,  William,  255 

Music,  German  supremacy  in, 
69 


N 


Neale,  Dr.,  35 
Neap-Tide,  a  poem,  161 
Newman,  Cardinal,  106-109 
Newman,  Francis,  107 
Nichol,  John,  152,  185' 
Nineteenth  Century,  The,  an  ar- 
ticle for,  80,  81 


Nodier,  Charles,  147,  148 
Norfolk,  the  Duke  of,  174,  175 
Northcourt,  7,  8,  9,  63 
Novel,  an  unpublished,  28 
Nuremberg,  53 


Ode  on  the  Statue  of  Victor  Hugo, 

72 
Oliver  Twist,  9 
Orchard,  The,  a  house  at  Niton, 

5 

Orsini,  88 

Oxford,  the  Bishop  of,  146 

Oxford,  Swinburne  at,  56  et  seq. 


Parliament,  offer  of  a  seat  in, 
104,  105 

Penskill  Castle,  151 

Pilgrimage  of  Pleasure,  The,  21 

Pitlochry,  adventures  of,  68 
et  seq. 

Polignac,  115,  116 

Popery,  "The  monstrous  doc- 
trines of,"  128-. 

"Poppyland,"  an  article  in  the 
Daily  Telegraph,  176 

Portraits  of  Swinburne,  12 

Powell,  George,  85,  loi,  118 

Procter,  B.  W.  ("Barry  Corn- 
wall"), 121 

Procter,  Mrs.,  70,  121,  123,  124, 
126,  127,  133,  206,  231 

Puritanism,  the  shortcomings  of, 

152 
Puy  de  D6me,  the,  190 


R 


Raffaelle,  a  picture  by,  64 
Readings,  exhausting,  92 
Redesdale,  Lord,  7,  12 
Republicanism  explained,  87, 243 
Republicanism  at  Oxford,  155 
Republic,  England  as  a,  238 
Reunion  after  death,  223 
Rhine,  the  beauties  of  the,  48 
Riding  accident,  a,  19 
Ritchie,  Mrs.,  147,  150 
Rogers,  Samuel,  a  visit  to,  10 


INDEX 


261 


Roi  s'amuse,  Le,  Hugo's  drama, 

71 
Rosamund,  Queen  of  the  Lombards, 

5,  245,  246 
Rose  and  the  Ring,  The,  147 
Rossetti,  Christina,  112,  113 
Rossetti,  Dante  Gabriel,  28,  29, 

no,  III,  157,  234 
Rossetti,  death  of  Mrs.,  no 
Rossetti,  W.  M.,  229 


Saffi,  95 

St.  George,   the  Church  of,  at 

Cologne,  47 
St.   Ursula,   the   Church  of,  at 

Cologne,  46 
San  Zenone,  the  Church  of,  at 

Verona,  66 
Sandwich,  Lord,  43 
Sark,  185  et  seq. 

Scalas,  the  monuments  of  the,  66 
Schehallion,  the  ascent  of,  68 
Schumann,  Mme.,  loi 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  151 
Scott,  William  Bell,  151 
Sea-gulls,  episode  of  the,  15,  16 
Sewell,  Elizabeth,  218 
Shakespeare,  explanations  of,  to 

a  child,  132,  164 
Sharpe,  the  engraver,  123 
Shelley,  184 
,    Mrs.    Procter  and,    123, 

127 
,  an  Italian  monument  to, 

162 

Swinburne's  essay  on,  221 

Shorcham  Church,  169 

estuary,  169 

infant,  the,  a  phenomenon, 

170 
— —,  memories  of,  180,  181 
Sichon,  the,  211,  212 
Sidestrand,   near   Cromer,    176, 

178 
Siena,  n7 

Skewton,  Mrs.,  Swinburne's  im- 
personation of,  8 
Spiritualism,    impostures,     124, 

125 
Staff  a,  115 
Stanley,  Lord,  defends  Mazzini, 

88 


Stevenson's  Ballads,  151 
Stubbs,  Bishop,  57,  58,  59,  60 
Sullivan,  Sir  Arthur,  207 
Susses  scenery,  167 
Swallows  on  a  lake,  222 
Swinburne's  father  and  mother, 

255 

Swinburne,  Miss  Julia,  the  diar- 
ies, 253 

Swinburne,   Edward,   an  uncle, 

255 
Swinburne,  Sir  John,  1 1 
Swinburne,  Lady,  mentioned  by 

Gray,  218 


Tale  of  Two  Cities,  A ,  9 
Talfourd's  Tragedies,  254 
Tennyson,  Alfred,  Lord,  10,  33, 

139,157.  234,  254 
Tennyson,  Lady,  228 
Terry,  Ellen,  145 
Thunderstorms,  69,  248 
Ticonderoga,  the  legend  of,  151 
"Timber-ponds"  at  Shoreham, 

173 

Titian's  St.  Afra,  65 
Travailleurs  de  la  Mer,  149 
Trelawny,  E.  J.,  125,  236 
Trench.  Archbishop,  his  Sacred 

Latin  Poetry,  78 
Trusty  in  Fight,  22 
Turner,  J.  W.  M.,  143,  175,  184, 

245 
Tyne,  the,  below  Keeldar,  44 


Vacquerie,  Auguste,  71,  240 
Varlcy,  John,  255 
Venice,  the  Academy  at,  65 
Venturi,  Mme.,  103 
Verona,  65 

Verschoyle,  Rev.  J.,  216 
Victoria,  Queen,  202,  203,  204 
Villcquicr,  where  Hugo's  wife  and 
daughter  were  buried,  82 

W 

Wagner,  a  poem  (in  French)  on 

Music  by,  69 
,  George  Powell  and,  85 


262 


INDEX 


Wales,  the  Prince  of,  56,  202 

Watts-Dunton,  Theodore,  32, 
70  et  seq.,  81,  84,  95,  96,  106, 
107,  112,  118,  128,  131,  134, 
135,  136,  137.  138,  142,  146, 
147,  152,  153,  154,  157,  158, 
160,  162,  165,  168,  176,  178, 
181,  184,  198,  200,  202,  203, 
204,  213,  217,  219,  221,  229, 
231,  234,  236,  240,  244 

Week  in  a  French  Country  House, 
A,  the  author  of,  114 

Weeping  oak,  A,  53 

Whin  bushes,  228 

Whistler,  103 


Wiesbaden,  49-55 
Wimbledon  Park,  229,  232,  233 
Woodford,    Swinburne's    tutor, 

140 
Wordsworth,  William,  234 
Wordsworth,  Mrs.  Procter  and, 

127 
Worthing  described,   169,   171- 

175 
Wurtzburg,  53 


York,  a  Shetland  pony,  5 


Ji  Selection  from  the 
Catalogue  of 

G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 


Complete  Catalogue  sent 
on  application 


Ji  Woman's  'Defense 


My  Own  Story 

By  Louisa  of  Tuscany 

Ex-Crown  Princess  of  Saxony 

With  19  Illustrations  from  Original  Photographs 
8°.    $2.50  net.     (By  maiU  $2.65) 

In  this  volume  Princess  Louisa  gives  for  the 
first  time  the  authentic  inside  history  of  the  events 
that  led  to  her  sensational  escape  from  the  Court 
of  Saxony  and  her  meeting  with  Monsieur  Giron, 
with  whom'the  tongue  of  scandal  had  associated  her 
name.  It  is  a  story  of  Court  intrigue  that  reads 
like  romance. 

"  As  the  story  of  a  woman's  life,  as  a  descrip- 
tion of  the  private  affairs  of  Royal  houses,  we  have 
had  nothing  more  intimate,  more  scandalous,  or 
more  readable  than  this  very  frank  story." 

Miss  Jeannette  L.  Gilder  in  "  The  Reader." 

*  Frank,  free,  amazingly  intimate,  refreshing. 
.  .  .  She  has  spared  nobody  from  kings  and 
kaisers  to  valets  and  chambermaids." 

London  Morning  Post. 

**  The  Princess  is  a  decidedly  vivacious  writer, 
and  she  does  not  mince  words  in  describing  the 
various  royalties  by  whom  she  was  surrounded. 
Some  of  her  pictures  of  Court  life  will  prove  a 
decided  revelation  to  most  readers." — N.  Y.  Times. 

New  York        G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons         London 


My  Path  Through  Life 

By  Lilli  Lehmann 

Translated  from  the  German  by 
Alice  Benedict  Seligman 

S^    About  500  pp.     With  50  Illustrations 

^5. so  net 

Mme.  Lehmann  gives  us  a  volume  of  memoirs, 
musical  and  personal,  which  will  command  the 
attention  of  the  world-wide  public  which  this 
great  singer  has  charmed.  The  book  is  written 
with  her  characteristic  sincerity  and  frankness. 
She  unfolds  the  complete  story  of  her  life,  de- 
voting a  generous  measure  of  attention  to  her 
friends  and  rivals  upon  the  operatic  stage. 

Her  achievements  in  Prague,  Leipsic,  Vienna, 
and  elsewhere,  her  struggles  in  Berlin,  her  ex- 
tended tours  in  Europe  and  America,  are  fasci- 
natingly told.  She  presents  an  account  of  her 
collaborations  with  Wagner  at  Bayreuth,  and 
tells  of  her  experiences  at  Court. 

The  pleasant  as  well  as  the  arduous  aspects  of 
the  artist's  career  are  presented  with  a  wealth 
of  anecdote. 

G.  P.  Putnam*s  Sons 

New  York  London 


M 

emories    of 
Youth 

1844-1865 

My 

By  George  Haven  Putnam 

Late  Brevet-Major,  176th  Reg't,  N.  Y.  S.  Vols. 

Author  of  "  Memoir  of  G.  P.  Putnam,"  "Life  of  Lincohi," 

"A  Prisoner  of  War  in  Virginia,"  "Books 

and  Their  Makers,"  etc. 

8^.     WUh  Portraits.    $2.50  net. 

Mr.  Putnam's  Memories  include  a  record  of  sojourns 
in  England  in  1844,  in  1851,  and  in  i860;  experiences 
as  a  student  in  the  University  of  Paris,  in  Berlin,  and  in 
Gottingen ;  and  a  record  of  service  during  the  strenuous 
years  of  the  Civil  War,  extending  from  September,  1862, 
to  September,  1865.  This  service  covered  campaigns  in 
Louisiana  (including  the  Red  River  Expedition  and  work 
in  the  completing  of  Colonel  Bailey's  Dam),  the  cam- 
paign with  Sheridan  in  the  Valley  of  the  Shenandoah, 
and  the  decisive  action  at  Cedar  Creek.  The  volume 
includes  also  a  record  of  experiences  in  Libby  and  Danville 
prisons  during  the  last  year  of  the  War.  A  supplementary 
chapter  gives  a  brief  account  of  service  in  maintaining 
order  in  Savannah  after  the  close  of  the  War  but  before 
the  re-establishment  of  civil  government. 


The  Autobiography  of 
Thomas  Jefferson 

1743=1790 

Together  with  a  Summary  of  the  Chief  Events 

of  Jefferson's  Life  from  1789  to  his 

death  in  1826 

Introduction  by  Paul  Lester  Ford 
Foreword  by  George  Haven  Putnam 

iz^,    $i.SO  net 

In  this  new  edition  of  Thomas  Jefferson's 
Autobiography,  the  notes  and  introduction  by 
Paul  Lester  Ford  have  been  utilized  and  there 
has  been  written  a  foreword  especially  for  the 
edition  by  George  Haven  Putnam. 

The  Autobiography  of  the  great  Virginian 
belongs  to  the  literature  of  the  Nation,  and  in 
view  of  the  fact  that  it  was  left  incomplete, 
there  has  been  added  in  the  present  edition  a 
chronological  outline  of  the  principal  events  of  his 
career,  thus  rounding  out  the  biography  without 
interfering  with  the  personal  charm  that  at- 
taches to  the  narrator's  own  account  of  his  life. 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

N«^nr  YorK  London 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


*P  1 7  ms 


Form  L9-Series  444 


UC  SOUTHERN 


REGIONAL  LIBRARVffClL'TY 


AA    000  376  414    9 


iiiiiiiillllilllil  i  1 


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